


The Disappearance of Betty Cooper

by IEatBooksForTea



Series: The Disappearance of Betty Cooper [1]
Category: Archie Comics & Related Fandoms, Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst, Crime, F/M, Missing Persons, Mystery, Romance, bughead - Freeform, possible death, possible foul play, possible suicide
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-14
Updated: 2018-07-31
Packaged: 2019-01-17 05:25:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 38,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12358428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IEatBooksForTea/pseuds/IEatBooksForTea
Summary: It has been six years since Jughead Jones set foot inside Riverdale. A month before he left, his girlfriend Betty Cooper vanished without a trace. And her case has gone cold. Now that he's back, he's determined to find out what happened to Betty Cooper. And whether he's one of the reasons she vanished in the first place.





	1. Many Happy Returns

**Author's Note:**

> An idea that's been bouncing around in my head for a little while now.  
> This is set post season one and, depending on events, may incorporate season two.  
> I will update chapters when I can.  
> Comments make me happy (and motivate me to write more!)

The day that Betty Cooper disappeared, I was in the shower.

It had been like a portal. The Jughead that had stepped into icy cold water, unaware and unassuming, was not the Jughead that had stepped out.

It was as if the whole world had known. The shower had sucked in a breath as I'd switched it off. The glass doors had shivered as I'd climbed out.

And I was greeted with a cellphone alive with missed messages.

My hand, oblivious and ungratefully carefree, had reached out. And, ignorant of its unbearable weight, had picked it up.

If I had known then the reality on the other side of that phone, would I have even swiped by thumb against the screen?

I breathe out and stare at Riverdale.

It is now a skeleton of a town. Wind howls through streets like rattling bones. Litter crackles along the asphalt like tumbleweeds.

This place, this community that I used to call my own, is hollow.

I step forward. I worry that I'll break the brittle road with my feet.

Passers by stare at me, a stranger. No wonder they don't recognise me. Now that my black hair is chopped away from my face and my head is eerily void of any sort of hat.

I feel their eyes on me. They dwindle in their broken groups, rotating in a repeating life. Work, home, school. Work, home, school.

I make a point to look at them as I walk by. The one who broke away.

Or the second. Depending on what you believe about Betty.

I thumb the key in my pocket. It's hard edges grate along the skin of my palm. How ironic that it would be just a chunk of metal that brought me back here.

It had thumped through my letterbox, the contents of a well wrapped parcel. Usually I glower at the sight of anything remotely covered in tape. But this time I had been  _sure_  Santa had finally delivered on his promise to send me a lifetime supply of Frosted Flakes.

Instead, he'd sent me this.

A block of metal. I drag it out, letting it rest heavily in my hand. It's rusted grooves barely alight in the dim sun. I scoff. How oddly humorous that it almost resembles me.

I let it thud to the bottom of my pocket.

With a heave, my feet follow the worn contours of the street. They know the exact route in which to take. It doesn't matter that I've been gone six years.

I had never intended to come back here. Not after everything that had happened. When I had packed up what little belongings I'd had, stuffed them into a duffel bag and hauled myself onto a bus, it was a finale. A farewell, hope to never see you again, goodbye.

Funny how things come back to bite you. When the universe demands a season two.

Well, here you go, Universe. Hope you're happy.

The buildings seem to whisper as I pass by them. They mould with the murmuring gossip of the people staring at me. I study their hardened faces, searching for any recognisable features. Anybody stuck in the past.

That flash of red hair in the distance could be Archie, perpetually sixteen and stubbornly zealous.

That woman over there might be Veronica, unaware that the pearl necklace she wears are the very shackles binding her here.

A cockled laugh in a crowd could very well be Kevin, the click of heels against concrete might be Cheryl. Here, in this desolate, godforsaken place, there are a thousand people mingled with a thousand possibilities. And only harsh one reality.

Betty Cooper is not among them.

Betty had awoken a dormant Riverdale the day she went missing. The act of one girl had thrown a boulder sized chunk of reality through people's closed windows.

They immediately swarmed together like bees, rallying forces to search for this missing Cooper. They scoured the nearby forest, clasping hands with one another just in case one of them stumbled upon her body. Missing posters were plastered on every flat surface in town, a crude kind of wallpaper. Everywhere I had turned, I had caught a glimpse of the missing girl with the wide smile and the ponytail.

It had hurt, seeing her like that, trapped in a photograph. It wasn't good enough. Not if Betty wasn't here. Not if I couldn't reach inside that photo and pull her out.

Because a photograph is only as real as it was flat. It feels an awful lot like me.

Now all those photographs are gone. The walls around this town are barren. Pristinely void of any pictures or posters, as if it's trying to hide its own secrets.

All of this is now just a myth. A legend. A murmur amongst people, the lessens taught to children before bedtime. The story of the girl who disappeared.

Paper flutters. It catches my attention. The paper is strapped to a lamppost, plastered on top with newer gaudy advertisements and flyers for events. Some garish school dance, a two for one offer at POP'S. An advertisement for maple syrup.

The paper sits underneath, barely visible. The wind toys with its corners.

It's starkly white.

I reach forward, lifting up the pile of newer posters. There, underneath them all, is her face. She smiles out into the world, a woman of sixteen, her hopes her dreams all wrapped up in her eyes.

I yank it down. The corner rips as it detaches from the lamppost. I look at it once, capturing her face, before folding it carefully and threading it into my pocket.

If these people don't care enough to remember her, at least I'll be someone who does.

With a heave, I follow my feet through the streets to the trailer park. The key weighs heavily in my pocket. It's as if it's reacting to the nearness of its counterpart.

I let my feet crunch gravel as I head towards what I came here for - my father's trailer. It's paint sprayed walls are even more rusted than how I'd remembered it. I kick my toe against the side of it, hearing the metal creak. In any other town than Riverdale, this rust bucket would have magnificently collapsed by now. Yet things in Riverdale have always stood still.

And that includes time.

I drag myself to what remains of the front door. Giving it a shove, I hear it groan under my weight. But it stands still, protecting whatever junk is inside. I guess that's why I needed the key.

I pull it out of my pocket, the edges snagging on the newly pocketed missing poster. I weigh the key in my hand, jumping it between fingers as if it were hot coals, debating on the worth of actually using it.

But I move. I shove the rigid end of the key into the trailer lock, twist it and hear the familiar click. A weight lies between me and the door. Well, what had I come here for if not to look inside?

And I push it open. It creaks in protest, threatening to fall off its hinges.

The place is hazy with dust. I step into the black smog. My feet clatter against empty beer cans on the floor. In any other world, I would have piled them all up and thrown them in the trash. But they belong to my father. Even if it is what killed him.

I step over the ashes of my father's life, staring at all the mess it's in. Floor littered, furniture stained, damp creeping up the walls.

I let out a scoffing breath. "Welcome home." I roll my eyes, picking up an empty beer can and flipping it over in my hand. "All my worldly possessions."

When I'd left Riverdale, I'd never intended to keep in touch with my dad. He'd stumbled out of jail and right back into the serpents lair. I'd seen a glimpse of that life he'd been living and it was what had thrown me over the edge and out of town – my girlfriend had been missing for a month and my father had disappeared once again into a life of alcohol.

But I hadn't imagined that he'd die in the six years I'd been gone.

Not when everything in Riverdale is supposed to stand still. Well, until a Blossom is murdered, a house is burned down and a Cooper goes missing for six years.

It turns out though, even if your son leaves town never to contact you again, you still leave everything you own to him in your will. And that includes a cranky old trailer and a motorbike stashed round the back.

I piece my way through the mess, finding a stack of cardboard boxes stashed in the corner. My father used to keep all his important things in cardboard boxes. They were cheap to find, easy to carry and nobody ever suspected a cardboard box. Not compared to a safe hidden in a wall or a briefcase with too many buckles.

Thumping myself down on the dusty sofa, I pull up the first box. It's full of junk like charging wires and odd kitchen utensils. Not exactly something I'd remember my father by.

The next box is just as useless, stashed with plastic bags, a ball of string and what remains of my father's old office job. I let it thump beside me next to the other box.

I freeze when I pick up the last box. It looks just as mundane as the others except on the front a word has been scrawled with black sharpie; Jughead.

Tentatively, I pull open the lid. On top, as limp as the day I'd left it, is my hat.

I'd thrown it aside, a way to make a statement, when I'd left this place. It was supposed to be symbolism for leaving everything behind and starting afresh. As soon as I'd climbed onto the bus to head to mom's, I'd instantly regretted it. My head was deftly cold and instantly self-conscious about that hat.

Now it sits before me, a haunting memory of my past. I pick it up, feeling it's empty weight in my hands. It used to hold so much significance, it had felt like a brick.

With a sigh, I lay it aside, delving into the rest of my box. Somehow, my dad had managed to stuff my old laptop in here. It stands on it's side, crammed into the corner where it used to be open twenty-four seven. My fingers had filled it with ideas and words and now it lies empty and dormant. I lift it out, lying it beside my hat.

I almost laugh when I see the next object. The old portable tape recorder had been my attempt at being a journalist as a kid. I'd lugged it around to all the kids at school, demanding they comment on the segregation and abomination that was the school dance. Archie had just laughed into the microphone, and Betty had smiled and said, "What do you want me to say, Jug?"

I could tell by the brightness of her eyes, even at the age of twelve, that she loved the school dance. And I had immediately decided to report on something else.

I pull it out and snort at it's size. The attached microphone dangles from the brick sized recorder. How had I ever managed to lug this thing around as a kid? It could be used to build a house – or to smash through a window.

Setting it beside me, I pull out the next object – it's a polaroid camera. Something Betty had gifted me once, when we'd still just been friends. She'd said it made all photographs look better. It was the perfect gift for a writer. I had just scoffed at her. But it had been her way of believing in magic.

And, without even questioning it, I'd kept it. Stashed it away, like a stolen piece of her.

The film inside is still unused.

I lift it up, unveiling the rest of the box's contents.

My heart plummets. It's all my notes. Scrawls and charts of everything that could have possibly happened to Betty when she'd disappeared.

I had recounted the last time she'd been seen, the last interaction we'd had with each member of her family. The last text she'd ever sent me.  _"I love you"._

I had been furious. The police, the sheriff, weren't doing a quick enough job of finding her. I'd thought that maybe if I, someone who knew enough about her secrets, searched hard enough, I'd find her.

She'd be safe and happy and be waiting for me just to shout, "Surprise!"

I'd have broken down and told her how much I hated surprises. And then I'd bury her into my arms and hold her and take her home back where she belonged.

But it turned out that Betty had had more secrets than even I had known. And, even with every inch of searching, I'd never seem to come close to finding her. It was like she didn't want to be found.

And when police investigate the disappearance of a teenage girl, they tend to suspect the boyfriend first.

So I'd used all the remains of my energy to prove my innocence, packed up my stuff and fled town.

It had been too much. Everything in Riverdale reminded me of her. And, even more so, reminded me that, over everything, I might have been the reason she left.

Maybe my running away had been my way of chasing after her.

I lift out the paper work, the remains of a weak, amateur investigation into the disappearance of a girlfriend. It almost feels pointless as I flick through the pages.

A photograph tumbles out. It's old and worn but as soon as I pick it up, I feel the familiar creases.

It's a picture of the two of us. Me, in my crown beanie, trying my best not to make my smile look uncomfortable. And Betty in her cheerleading outfit, leaning in and pressing a kiss to my cheek.

She had insisted on taking that picture, telling me it was a memory. I had glowered at her, but it had been impossible to say no. Especially when her face was glowing and her eyes were alight with excitement.

Maybe they should have put this photograph on her missing poster. Betty Cooper, disappeared on September 6th, 2018, and Jughead Jones, the boy who has since disappeared inside himself.

"Where are you, Betty?" I hear my voice croak as I whisper out the words. In that split second, my brain tells me that it's too late for me to ever ever find out.

No. I scramble together the sheets of paper and shove them into a nearby backpack. Without thinking, I grab the poloroid camera and the tape recorder and throw them in too.

It's never too late.

I fold up the photograph and join it with the missing poster in my pocket, throwing my now empty box aside.

I grab my beanie in my fist, standing up resolutely. My hand snatches the strap of the backpack and I swing it over my shoulder.

If the police aren't going to solve this, someone has got to step up.

I stride towards the door of the trailer and march outside, feeling my hear beat quicken and my determination rise.

I'm going to find out what happened to Betty Cooper.

And I shove my hat on top of my head.


	2. Last Sightings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who read, left kudos and commented on last chapter, it means the world!  
> I hope you like chapter two just as much!

Pop's hasn't changed.

It stands illuminated against the gloomy, grey sky, as bright and as delicious as it has ever been.

I stand in front of the diner distracted by the old, portable recorder dangling out of my backpack. My fingers click at it's buttons, hearing it chewing at the tape inside it. I'd managed to salvage some blank tapes from the dollar store around the corner, still sealed in their plastic packaging.

Clearly, there are a lot of things that haven't aged in Riverdale.

I'd immediately unwrapped one and snapped it into place inside the recorder. Shaking the contraption, the tape rattling inside, I switch on the start button. It crackles to life.

Tentatively, I lift the attached microphone to my mouth and mutter; "This is Jughead Jones. January 25th, 2025-"

I stop short, hesitating for a moment. My finger instantly switches off the start button. The static cuts off. What else am I supposed to say?  _"Six years on. Sorry it's late"_?

I grumble an acceptance, satisfied with my less than eventful introduction, and hook microphone back into my backpack and stride into Pop's. The familiar bell chimes as I open the door.

The warm, greasy air that welcomes me is like a comfort blanket. I hadn't realised how much I'd missed Pop's until just this moment. This place had been a safe space, a place where, no matter who walked in, everyone would have something in common. They loved Pop's burgers.

Clearly, it's popularity hasn't changed since my school days. The diner is mulling with peppy teenagers, all clones of each other. Pretty sure I could point out a mini Archie in here or a Veronica. Or a Betty.

Shifting the backpack's strap on my shoulder, I adjust my hat lower across my eyes and, conscious of anyone recognising me, head to the bar.

Sliding onto one of the bar stools, I swing my backpack onto my lap and rifle through it to pull out the tape recorder.

"What can I get for you today?"

An old man's voice creases with politeness from behind the bar. I glance up, feeling his deep eyes on me, and he pauses.

"Hey there, kid," Pop finally says after a moment of chewing on his words and a wrinkled smile forms on his face.

I subconsciously tug at my hat. Guess this thing doesn't do that great a job of making me unrecognisable.

I let out a low, brief chuckle, toying with a short smile of my own. "Not much of a kid anymore, Pop," I shrug, shaking my head. Pop has a way of making anyone, no matter how much of an outsider, feel at home. Distracted, I clatter the recorder onto the bar and pull out the wad of notes I'd stuffed in the bottom of the bag.

I catch Pop glance at it consciously, his crinkled eyes clearly wary of it's presence. But he doesn't comment on it. Instead, he looks back up at me and sighs, "I heard about your father." The condolences are simmering in his eyes.

I can't imagine there are many people in Riverdale who are sad about my father's death.

"Yeah. Thanks, Pop," I mutter, throwing my backpack onto the bar stool beside me and adjusting my tape recorder absent-mindedly. It feels criminal to sit here so leisurely and think about Betty.

I've done my fair share of thinking about her in this diner.

Yet before I can even squeeze in another thought, Pop, suddenly bright with enthusiasm, claps his wrinkled hand against the counter and announces, "I'll rustle you up a burger. On the house."

Usually, I wouldn't accept sympathy. But when it comes in the form of a burger, all other arguments are invalid.

I let out a breathy laugh and smile at him. "You know me too well," I call after him as he turns around, hands suddenly busy with rustling up said burger.

With the same smile still lingering on my lips – at the thought of Pop's legendary burgers – I glance back down at my adolescent notes, shuffling through them. It makes me feel as if I'm doing something useful with this case, something practical, when in reality, all I'm doing is avoiding it.

Where does anyone even start when they go searching for their missing girlfriend?

"Jughead Jones."

The voice is matter-of-fact. I can feel it's breath on the back of my neck. It loiters behind me, a clear statement of truth. Jughead Jones. Congratulations, that's me. You just won the lottery.

I let out a long sigh, feeling the weight of reality and six long years finally rest on my shoulders. Dropping my notes onto the counter, I slowly swivel around on my bar stool and face whichever person from my past has chosen to haunt me.

"Hey, Juggie," Betty Cooper smiles down at me.

My breath catches.

Her finger toys with the coils of her blonde hair, her eyes alight with sixteen year old dreams. She's squeezed into her old, cheerleading outfit, hand reached out to take mine. She bites gently and playfully on her glossed bottom lip.

She looks so alive.

Barely breathing, I break my own lips open to speak-

"Jughead."

Something snaps in front of my eyes.

I blink repeatedly, squeezing out whatever had just taken over me.

Truth replaces it.

The figure standing in front of me is not Betty Cooper.

"Kevin Keller," I croak, swallowing. I hide my shame in my hat.

"Hey," he replies, his facial expression battling between concern and animosity.

Six years has barely changed him. I shouldn't be surprised. Time churns slow in this place.

He stands broad shouldered, clad in his classic shirt and sweater combo, hands tentatively swinging out of his pockets. He's grown into his father's shoes, the very essence of a sheriff. He holds himself as if he's been patrolling this very diner. The last essence of an independent Kevin Keller is the tousled ends of his dark hair, untamed by his comb.

I haven't seen him since I left town. Betty Cooper had been the last thing we'd had in common. And then, when she disappeared, the only thing that had kept us together had been the desperate will to find her. We had even walked together when scouring the forest.

Then when I skipped and left town, I guess, like a frayed rope, all that had snapped.

I inhale, waiting for him to politely tell me to get the hell out.

Instead, he lets out a breath. "Sorry about your dad," he says shortly, the hardness in his eyes loosening slightly. "Guess you're here for his funeral?"

I blink. Okay. That was not what I was expecting. I roll my shoulders. "Among other things," I mutter, eyeing him expectantly. If he doesn't want to tell me to get lost, what does he want?

He shifts uncomfortably on the spot, eyes darting to the end of the diner. I follow his gaze to a crowd of curious onlookers. I feel myself scowl.

Kevin turns back to me, hesitantly pulls his hand out of his pocket and pats my shoulder. "Just," he grins sheepishly, looking incredibly uncomfortable. I suppose that's what six years does to a person, "wanted to say hi."

He turns to go and, in that split second, I see his father.

And I see the glimmer of an opportunity.

"Hey," I call back, feeling a surge of determination.

Kevin glances back at me, curious.

Maybe the thing we had in common hasn't changed all that much.

"When was the last time you saw Betty?" I say quickly,

"What?" A look of panic crosses his face and his creased eyes dart around the room. Then, in a gulp, he strides towards the bar stool beside me and misplaces my bag onto the floor. I stare at it in pure horror. "Listen," he mutters under his voice. His gaze passes a look to the notes and tape recorder in front of me. I don't make a move to pull them back. "It's maybe not a good idea for you to talk about her so openly around here." He looks pained. "Not anymore."

I stiffen defensively. "Why not?" My eyes narrow, my voice low. I can't help but notice how agitated Kevin looks, as if he's conflicted within his own self.

He sighs. His face visibly battles with his words. "Because," he breathes out, locking secure eyes with mine. He leans his arms forward against the counter top to make sure his words are heard, "people around here think you might have had something to do with it."

I almost scoff. My knuckles tense. What a lovely welcome home gift.

I shouldn't have expected anything less.

"What do you think?" I ask calmly, eyeing Kevin carefully.

"Heck no," he says almost instinctively and I, incredulously, believe him. "Look, you weren't exactly my  _favourite_ person back in high school – but it was clear you cared for her. Anybody would be crazy to think you'd do something to hurt her."

I pause, studying Kevin's face. "Is that what your dad thinks?"

Instantly, Kevin bends backwards, cracking his spine uncomfortably. His sigh is weary.

I catch sight of an opening. A fool would waste this moment. Leaning forward decisively, eyes pierced and determined, I ask, "Do you think you could talk to him for me?"

Kevin looks at me, conflicted.

"I," he starts, reluctant, apologetic, "don't really have much say in those kinds of things."

I shake my head, sighing. "No, I mean." I narrow my eyes, making my point carefully and divisively. Kevin looks startled, a deer fretting over whether to stay and stare at the headlights, or run headlong into the forest. "Do you think you could get Betty's case file from him?"

Something instantly snaps in Kevin's expression. "Why?" he asks sharply, looking concerned and defensive. His eyes dart back down to the notes and recorder in front of me. "What are you doing, Jughead?"

I swallow resolutely, knowing in that moment that no words are ever going to convince him. Instead, I say calmly and pointedly, "If you care remotely at all about Betty." I make sure to meet his dubious, uneasy gaze. I take a slow, steady breath."You'll meet me outside of town. At the old bus stop. Eight pm tonight."

Kevin splutters, coughing up words. It takes a while for anything coherent to tumble out of his mouth. "Why tonight?"

By this point, I've already swivelled back around to lean against the counter, a forever smiling Pop carrying a plate of gloriousness over to me. He plops it down proudly in front of me and I can instantly smell that I'm in heaven.

"Because," I pick up the juicy, round bun in two fists, eyes glistening at the sight of it, "right now, I have a hamburger to eat."

* * *

The bus shelter is a rusted auburn. Paint flicks off in curls, chipping to reveal the crackled metal underneath. Adjusting my backpack on my shoulder, I shine my recently acquired flashlight in its direction. Shadows repel in horror.

This place is quiet. A quell in between the rare churning of a passing car and the wind toying with the trees behind me. Anyone could so easily disappear here.

I hear a rumbling to my left, a flash of headlights in the dark, then the crank of a handbrake and the opening and closing of a car door.

"If this was your idea of a secret rendezvous," Kevin announces as he paces towards me along the side walk, footsteps echoing against the gravel, his hands stuffed into the pockets of a grey trench coat. His eyes dance around the dank scenery uneasily, "I think I prefer the lake."

"Don't get your hopes up," I mutter in response, digging into my pocket and pulling out another flashlight, my hand grazing against the ever present missing poster - and now folded up photograph.

With a swing of my arm, I throw the flashlight in Kevin's direction, calling "Catch!" as I do, and he fumbles to grab it.

He looks down at it bewildered, and I shrug as he looks up. "In case you couldn't see in the dark."

He mumbles a thanks before flicking it on.

The metal of the old bus shelter groans with the weight of the decaying wind. I swing my backpack from my shoulder and rummage in it to snatch the recorder. The light from my flashlight bounces around as I do, making shadows dance and passing cars confused.

Pulling the recorder out, I balance it in one hand while my other, flashlight holding hand readjusts my backpack. Without hesitation, I switch it on, hearing the familiar crackling. Lifting the microphone to my mouth, I open my mouth-

"Remind me again why we're here?" Kevin sounds curious as he paces slowly towards me, steps cautious and intrigued.

I glance back at him, shifting the microphone to my side. But I don't switch it off.

"Because, Keller," I sigh, hearing it waft up into the breeze. I turn my flashlight onto his face as he blinks harshly. "This is the last place Betty was seen."

My flashlight passes over him and darts up the slope behind the bus shelter. The light flits in between dense trees, the edge of the Riverdale forest, wavering like a fog. It loses itself between thick branches and twisted roots. Rusted cogs in my brain churn and click, the very thought of Betty oiling them.

I hear Kevin shudder, his own eyes trained on the trees. "You're not expecting to just stumble across her b-"

"No," I retort, snapping my eyes back to him. "I just thought-" I start, very much sounding like I'm opening up to him. And maybe I am, but I'm also acutely aware of the fact that my recorder is still switched on and I might as well be documenting as I'm blabbing. "Maybe if I came here, I might get a feel for what it was like. When she vanished."

My eyes are hard. I can feel their sharpness in my skull.

But they don't miss the sympathy and pain passing over the eyes of the man standing in front of me. I breathe out slowly. I'd be ridiculous to believe he doesn't miss her too.

I dart my eyes away, my brow creasing. I flick the flashlight around, eyes following its light trail. I can't think about any of that right now, anything of the past. Except her. I need to think about her.

I inhale sharply.

"From what I remember," I start formulating aloud, pacing around the bus shelter, headlights of another passing car rolling over me, "She was last seen here around eight thirty pm by a passing bus driver."

I hear Kevin shift behind me and I know he recognises the story. His own light is flitting around.

"He asked her if she was looking for a lift," I continue, studying the gravel of the sidewalk where it meets the trawling of the weeded grass. "To which she said no. About ten minutes later, Fred Andrews drives past, sees her and offers her another lift. She says no, says she's waiting for someone. He agrees, drives for about half a mile that way," I lift my torch in the direction into town. The light flickers off into the murky distance. "Where he parks, takes out his phone and-"

"Calls her mom," Kevin corroborates, clearly recalling the timeline.

I glance back at him, eyebrows knotted before appreciatively nodding.

"He calls Alice to tell her that her daughter is out here all alone," I continue, reading from the script in my mind. I can hear my thoughts churning in my mind. "Says he'll double back and check she's okay. And-"

"And when he does," Kevin sighs, clearly this part of the story being the hardest for him to bear. "She isn't there anymore.

My shoulders sag. They drag me down. "Right," I agree, looking at him and past him and at everything, trying to work everything out. "And if I can corroborate that timeline with the police file. Well- that's a hell of a small amount of time to go missing."

A heavy weight falls between the two of us. A familiarity of darkness. I pull my flashlight into the dense forest, then along the stretch of endless road out of town, then cast it over another passing car. Surveying every direction, every possibility, none of them looking more or less likely.

And every one of them possibly leading to her disappearance.

"Do you think she's alive?" I hear my voice croak out.

Kevin reacts, jolting still. I feel him stiffen, the reaction of grief. He sighs; "I don't know." He pauses. The sadness in his voice is palpable. "Has anyone who ever went missing in Riverdale ever turned up alive?"

I turn to look at him, flashlight dipping as the shadows crease his face. He looks older, pained. For the first time, I relate to him.

"Betty hasn't turned up," I reply simply, as if that's a defiant statement that could make things true.

Kevin shrugs. It's a jolted, uncomfortable movement. But I can tell he wants this statement to be a flash of hope. I don't know if it's wise enough to give him that.

Slouching, I pull on my recorder, microphone swinging from the bottom of it, as I decide that I've probably recorded enough. Or that this tape will run out soon - because old things are always short lived.

As my finger stretches for the off switch, I hear Kevin, in a flurry of divisiveness, step towards me.

"I'll help you with my dad," he finally says.

I glance up at him, half surprised, catching the sight of determination in his eyes. And the wind loosening his hair.

His jaw flexes. "But you're not doing this investigation thing," he waves his hand in the direction of my tape recorder contraption. I quirk my lips upwards. The briefest evidence of a smile. "Without me."

A single eyebrow twitches on my face. Satisfaction tugs at me. Betty smiles in my head. She's overtly proud of being the one who brought these two idiots together.

I nod, eyeing Kevin meaningfully. He nods back.

"Deal."

And click the button to switch off the recorder.


	3. Witness A

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay with this chapter! Hope you enjoy it just as the rest. As usual kudos, bookmarks and comments are much appreciated! The support means so much!  
> P.S. I decided Kevin needed his own snippet of screen time. So, for future reference, anything that is written in third person is not from Juggie's POV. Thanks guys and enjoy! X

 

 

 

Kevin Keller had never been the most imaginative of people. He was one of those literal kind of guys. The kind who needed concrete, scientific reasoning for the existence of pineapple on pizza.

That was until the day Betty Cooper disappeared. And then he'd started imagining everything that could have possibly happened to her.

Had she run away? Grabbed a new identity on the way out and cashed in on a fresh new life elsewhere? Had she been picked up by someone in a passing car only to be the tragic victim of murder? Or had she simply slipped into the forest, grabbed a rope and tied herself to a tree?

He'd stopped imagining those things when he'd realised she'd never come back.

Now here he is, standing in front of his father's office, imagining all the possible reactions his father could have to being asked for Betty's case file. The main one being Kevin's ultimate disownment from the family.

Flexing the muscles in his hand, Kevin swallows a breath, stealing some confidence with it. And, tucking a loose curl of hair back into its place behind his ear, he paces forward, knocks on the door and opens it.

His father, greying and aged, glances up from behind his desk.

"Hey there, Son," his face creases, his voice calm, pen poised above a sheet of paper. The Sheriff slowly caps it and lays it down on the desk. "It's been a while."

* * *

If frustration had a flavour, it would be the exact taste of this microwavable burger. Delicious on the packet – limp, soggy and dull when cooked. With an uninspired chew, I slouch on the nearby work table and stare blankly at the wall in front of me. It is supposed to be loaded with clues and photographs, strings and maps, a complex of thoughts and ideas and theories. A trail of breadcrumbs leading me to Betty.

Currently, it is tortuously bare except for one photograph. The one of Betty and me, pinned securely with a thumb tack in the centre of the wall; her name plastered crudely underneath.

With an irritated puff of air, my arm falls, limp burger in hand, dripping grease onto the cold floor. I groan under my breath, the blank wall taunting me. It sneers, clicking its teeth in a satisfied snarl. It knows I have no clue what I'm doing, that I'm out of my depth. That I'm drowning in my need to find out what happened to Betty and I have no way to save myself let alone her.

My free fingers twist into my short hair, hat dripping from my head onto the floor behind me.

I tug on what's left of my brain cells.

How the hell is one wall going to solve a six year old mystery?

With a grind of my teeth, I fling the remains of my burger into the nearby trash can, hearing the satisfied plop, and I drop onto the floor. Scrambling, I grab nearby sheets of paper and uncap a sharpie, scribbling names in big, block capitals. People that matter. People that Betty might have spoken to, ones that might have seen her. A circle, a string of people connected to her.

I hear the mocking chatter of my former teachers inside my head; _"Writing things down helps you remember."_

"Remember _this_ ," I mutter sarcastically under my breath before ripping the paper and nailing Fred Andrews name onto the wall. The thumb tack slides into the plaster with a fulfilling pop. Next is the Bus Driver. He was the one who offered her a ride first. Maybe he'll remember something important, the littlest detail that only someone close to Betty would recognise. The slightest twitch in her temperament. I'll have to find out his identity from Sheriff Keller. They kept him anonymous in the papers.

Then I hang up Kevin's name. I can almost imagine the guy's horrified face, witnessing his name up on a crude, witness board. But, I tap the piece of paper assuringly, the guy knows something. He's keeping it close.

My hands scribble out the remains of other names. People like Poppy and Alice, Archie and Veronica. The people of this town that Betty surrounded herself with. The people that she used to wrap her up like a present, like a parcel to be shipped out of town. The people that meant the most to her; even if they're no longer lingering in this town.

In a split second decision, I grab the polaroid camera from my half opened backpack, contents spewing out, and turn it on to myself. I stare into the lens, tired and determined, and press the flash. The photograph is chewed out. I grab it and, before it's even developed, pin it onto the board. And join it with the block letters of "Jughead Jones" underneath.

My feet step back. My chest heaves as if I'd just been overworking my muscles. I stare at the wall, a mess of paper and names and sharpie marks. A feeling of sinking reality thuds at the bottom of my stomach. It echoes through the rest of my body. A feeling of uselessness. That, no matter what I've done, it's gotten me nowhere. Worthless. Waste of energy.

I groan, rubbing my eye with my fist.

"You should really work on your mind mapping skills," a lilting voice hums by my ear. I spin around, breath hovering in my throat. She leans against my work table, paper and pens and notes scattered all over it. She's warm in her blue sweater, white shirt poking out around her neck like spikes. With a rolling of her bright eyes, she tilts her head to the side, golden ponytail swinging cheerfully behind her head.

"Betty," I breathe out, feet tumbling forward, my body instantly feeling the need to capture her. But I stop myself, muscles twitching. The fear is rife in my body. The thought that, if I move, she'll vanish again.

Like a puff of smoke.

A gentle, knowing smile teases her lips, her eyes glowing with life. She parts her lips slowly, watching me as my hands trembling with the urge to touch her. Slowly, she hums, "Why didn't you come after me, Jug?"

My jaw unhooks. "I did," my voice grates against my throat. No matter how much I protest, it will not change the truth. "I- I tried to."

She doesn't seem to be listening. Instead, her eyes roll towards the wall, ethereal and ghostly. I don't dare to disconnect my gaze from her. In case she disappears again.

"Fred Andrews tried," she states simply. She tilts her head the other way. Her ponytail looks like a noose.

I choke on my words. They feel like a bitter burning in my throat. My eyes finally fully detach from her, flinging to the wall. Fred's name is bold and black and- not mine.

"Betty, I-" I fling my eyes back round to face her. Desperate. Lonely.

But she's gone. Vanished. All that's left is that empty void where my mind had played tricks on me.

For one second, I let my throat choke down a sob before a grit of determination grips me and I stride forward, scooping up my backpack, recorder and notes in tow, and clamber out of the trailer in a hurry.

I'm going to find Fred Andrews.

* * *

The door of Andrews Construction swings open with an eerie echo. The floor is a dusty grey. That same colour bleeds into the walls, into every crack and corner. The place is empty. Void of tables and chairs, of cabinets and paperwork. Faded orange graffiti drips from the walls. A scatter of litter flicks across the floor, a rolling beer can joining it. It rattles in the hollow space.

Looks like Fred's not been working here for a while.

I adjust the strap of my backpack with a frustrated huff, slamming my way back out the front door. I almost miss the bright red poster plastered on the outside of the building.

"We've moved!"

And in the centre of the building is a flashy, grey block of a building, the bright red letters of "Andrews Construction" plastered above it. A breath escapes from the back of my throat.

I mutter amusingly under my breath; "Looks like Fred Andrews went up in the world."

And I grab the poster, ripping it from its tape and stuff it confidently into my pocket. I stride purposefully across the barren, scattered construction site. I think I've developed a particular skill of stealing posters.

* * *

"Excuse me," I try to keep my voice as low as possible as I lean down towards the receptionist at the new and improved Andrews Construction offices. "I'd like to speak to, uh, Mr. Andrews, please."

The receptionist looks as unfazed as if she were a robot. She smiles sweetly - I'm sure that's in her manual somewhere - and blinks up at me politely. "Do you have an appointment?"

I shift uncomfortably, coughing my awkwardness away. "Not exactly," I start. Immediately, I see her eyes glaze over again, shifting into the routine of how to deal with unarranged customers. I lean forward, clapping my hand onto the desk with authority, my eyes piercing. "But I  _really_  need to see him."

She sways her head to the side - I think the information inside her head is too heavy for it - and smiles just as sweetly as before. "You'll just have to make an appointment for a later date, I'm sorry."

"Seriously?" I roll my eyes, scoffing. She doesn't flinch.

I can see her head begin to roll forward again, eyes about to make contact with her computer screen, her fingers about to clack on the keyboard. And I know that if any of those things happens, I'll have lost her attention. So, with a breath of rebellion, I snag Betty's missing poster out of my pocket and slap it in front of her.

Her eyes disconnect from her screen.

"Look," I start, making my voice as low as possible. "I'm a police officer looking into the disappearance of this girl." I tap Betty's face determinately and the receptionist seems to wince. "And it is  _extremely_  important that I talk to Mr. Andrews. Now."

Let's see if you have  _that_  in your manual.

She begins to splutter, malfunctioning, staring unblinking at the missing poster.

"I'll buzz you in," she finally says weakly before her finger - unguided by her fixated eyes - presses a button and unlocks the door behind her.

"Thanks," I mutter mockingly, shooting her a short, amused smile before gathering up the missing poster again and replacing it into my pocket, striding past her and into the hall of Andrews Construction. That was easy. I didn't even need a police badge.

* * *

The Head of Andrews Construction had never much liked police officers. In his experience, they were lackluster, inadequate and incredibly inefficient. He especially didn't like them when they came in the form of a surprise appointment allowed by his receptionist. Especially when they were probably riding up on his lift, striding down his hall and lifting a fist to knock on his office door.

He holds his breath, waiting for the knock to come.

Ever since her anxious call telling him that a mysterious police officer with a particularly ominous missing poster in hand was heading upstairs to his office, he'd become twitchy. The tie around his neck was suddenly too tight, his shirt buttoned up too far up his torso. He'd started consciously sorting through his paperwork as a way to calm himself down. It was therapeutic. He did it several times a day.

It makes him feel like he was more in control of his life than he actually was.

Maybe he should have been in control when she disappeared.

He adjusts his cuffs uncomfortably, pulling them down to his wrists again. Shop-purchased suits always had arms too short for him.

He's just about to reorganise his paperwork in alphabetical order – again - when the dreaded knock raps on his mahogany office door.

He springs from his leather chair, automatically pulling at his tie and calling with his most confident voice; "Come in!"

The lanky figure of a dark-clad man stalks in, complete with loose limbs and a backpack hanging from his shoulder. Black hair is hidden under an all too familiar, knitted crown hat.

Archie Andrews stares at the intruder, his lips gawking in a disbelieving smile.

"You're not a police officer," he breathes out, raising his eyebrows accompanied by a bewildered smirk. He blinks once. He should really get his eyes tested.

Jughead Jones stumbles where he stands, his face a vision of shock. He scoffs once, chews on his cheek and clearly stating the obvious; "You're not Fred Andrews."


	4. Best Friend

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I didn't mean to take that long to write this chapter! Sorry!  
> I hope this chapter makes up for the wait.   
> It'll definitely be better than that Jughead and Toni kiss (extended sobs!)  
> (As always, kudos, bookmarks and comments are always appreciated!)

Archie Andrew's was the last brave face I saw before I abandoned Riverdale.

The strap of my backpack had bitten down on my shoulder like a twisted metal rope, as if the bag was full of the rocks of my guilt. I hadn't thought, I wasn't thinking. Not when my feet had splashed in the black pools of rain. Not when my grip slipped on the wet sidewalk. Not when I'd kept pacing forward, determined to be a coward, determined to run away.

Not when Archie spotted me. Not when he tried to grab my wrist, his voice in a cloud of dust - "What are you doing? Jug? Jughead." Not when I had spun around, rain dribbling from my black hair like ink over my face, or when Archie had stared at me without my hat on as if I was a different person.

Or maybe it was because I wore a different face.

Rain dripped from the sky like tears. Archie wore them so effortlessly. He had done so ever since his best friend vanished.

And here I was, his other best friend about to run away too.

"I'm leaving," I'd croaked, sniffing once, a defiant raindrop dripping from the tip of my nose. And I'd gritted my teeth and spun away, my cold veins surging with a stubborn cowardice, powering my legs forward.

"Wait!" Archie had sounded so confused behind me, his voice barely lost in the curtain of rain. "You can't! Where are you  _going_?!"

Footsteps pounded behind me, slapping in puddles, the sound of a heartbeat. Racing. Brave.

I'd be naive to believe that I could outrun Riverdale's star football player. So when I felt no hand on my shoulder, no grip on my arm, I knew he wasn't coming after me. I knew he was letting me go.

And the rain on my face had begun to taste like salt water.

The footsteps had slowed and stopped, like a dead vein. Archie's voice was a shout from the distance, the last remnant of the brave man who stayed behind. The one who fought like I should have done. His cry croaked on the skyline; "She needs you!"

And I'd left anyway.

Now the sky is an aching grey outside of the wide set windows, the weight of rain and reality soaked into it like a wet sponge. It is as if the sky of Riverdale has always been this colour.

It is also currently the exact shade of Archie Andrew's face.

"You know I could have you done for impersonating a police officer," he says slowing, his voice trying out the sound of authority.

I just flex my fingers and shrug, eyebrows playful, even if the rest of my face isn't; "Who knows, I might have joined the police force by now."

Archie scoffs under his breath, a sound as if to suggest that such a thought is unbelievable. But it's half hearted. Instead, he relaxes his face, looks me in the eye and says, "It's good to see you, Jug." It is the simplest statement of recognition, of reunion, of remembrance. But its effect on me is instantaneous.

I warm.

"It's good to see you too, Arch," I nod back.

Finally, Archie's lips creak into a smile, the worn muscles in his face having been barely used over the years. And for the briefest moment, I see the preserved sixteen year old version of him. The face I'd grown up with as my best friend since childhood. The one who, despite how many times had betrayed me, was always reliable to what was right.

And then, as if it could be blown away by the wind, it disappears.

His face falls, an uncomfortable sympathy gracing his features. He pries open his lips; "Sorry about your da-"

"My dad, yeah, I know," I sigh, feeling tired of the worn sympathy and sudden care about my father's lack of existence. Not long ago, I'm sure they would have wished for it. "I heard." I sling my backpack from my shoulder, swing it over onto Archie's desk and lounge myself into the chair opposite. Archie stares at it as if I'd just thrown a bomb amongst his paperwork.

"I was actually looking for  _your_  dad," I add coyly, picking up a pen pot from Archie's desk and examining it, plucking a particularly flashy pen from it. "Seen him around?"

Archie observes me for a long moment. He adjusts himself and then strides around to his side of the desk, dropping himself into his chair. "You know, retirement, living the life." He folds his hands together over the desk. I can't fail to notice the way the middle finger on his right hand twitches. "Why are you looking for my dad, Jughead?"

My eyes flick above his head, catching glimpses of the folders lined up on shelves behind him. I hope Archie is still as oblivious as he was at high school, that he won't be clever enough to trace my eyeline. My reasonable eyesight surveys handwritten labels, ones like  _ **Accounts**_ ,  _ **Invoices**_ ,  _ **Backlogs**_. I peel my eyes away in disinterest. Nothing that screams "I know where Betty Cooper is".

"Can I get his phone number?" I ask casually, having picked up the pen and started clicking it repeatedly. In a swift movement, I poise the pen over a pad of sticky notes I've nabbed from his desk as if I believe he's not going to ask me any questions.

I almost hear my future self scoff at me. I shouldn't be so naive.

"What are you planning?" he raises his eyelids, his smile a mix of nostalgia and worry.

I cast my eyes back over his shoulder, flicking through paperwork pinned to his cork board. I inwardly survey time sheets and scribbled notes and a handwritten letter and the hidden photograph of a girl with a smile and a ponytail.

My heart quickens. My grip on the pen flexes.

I glance back at him once, cooling myself and quirking an eyebrow. "Who says I'm planning anything?"

"That look on your face," Archie makes a swift motion with his hand in the direction of my expression. I snort. I try to forget that the photograph on the cork board matches the girl on the poster in my pocket. "Also the fact that my  _receptionist_  phoned and said you were a police officer looking for a  _missing girl_. Come on, I've known you long enough."

I don't know what it is. Maybe the narrowing look of lost hope in his face as he mentions her. Or the hollow feeling in my stomach, the one that tells me that I have to suspect everyone. Or maybe it's just my gut instinct.

But I pull out my polaroid camera, catch a startled Archie on film and say, "I just wanted to ask him if he wanted to be a pallbearer in my dad's funeral."

The way he looks at me, the briefest flicker of scepticism before it dies weakly tells me he isn't aware that my dad is being cremated.

Pocketing the photograph, I throw the camera back inside my bag.

He creaks back in his chair, pulls out his cellphone and mutters, "I'll give you his number."

The minute he looks down at the screen of his phone, I leap out of my chair, lunge towards the board and snag the photo, dropping it into my bag. His head darts back up, eyes staring into me like stab wounds. Before he can speak, I scribble on the pack of sticky notes and throw them back to Archie who catches it like the football player he is.

"You know what, just get your dad to call me," I say, Archie glancing down at my phone number I've written down. "I've got some stuff I've got to get done."

He stares at me. For a minute, I think he might have figured it all out. That I've underestimated his ability to change. And then his gaze softens.

Then I let my lips flip into a brief smile. "You know. Funeral planning and all that."

Archie nods, the way he's supposed to. The way the nice guy, the brave man, the best friend always does.

I turn to the door, palm hovering over the handle.

"Hey," Archie calls out.

I freeze. I glance back around. His eyes are trained on me suspiciously.

"What are your doing with that photograph?" he says slowly.

My chest contracts. I breathe out. So he saw me after all. I couldn't expect to get away with everything after all.

I'm about to reach into my bag to retrieve the photo I'd stolen when I realise he's eyeing the polaroid of him poking out the top of my pocket.

I suck in an relieved exhilarating breath. I almost laugh.

I shrug once, twisting the handle and creaking open the office door. "Documenting." I flick my eyebrows up. "You know, for the funeral."

And I slip out.

* * *

"So," Kevin Keller's voice is heavy on the other end of my cellphone. "You might want to rethink that police report thing."

I sigh slow and long, standing in front of the Andrews Construction building, feeling curious and intrusive eyes flicker over me and analyse me. I glare at them once and the cower away like scuttling bugs.

"Don't tell me," I cluck, frustrated, fingers tugging on the short strands of hair underneath my hat. Who knew long hair was such a blessing for the irritated? "He basically said I'd have more luck catching a leprechaun on steroids?"

Kevin breathes heavily, a resounding agreement. "Basically," he scoffs, his voice the epitome of hopeless.

A trickle of rain taps onto my cheek. It feels like an icy fingernail. I glance up, sneering at the grey, cloudy sky and I pull the collar of my jacket up around my neck, turning to walk along the side of the road.

"You know, in legal terms," Kevin clarifies. I strain to hear his voice as the rain drips harder around me, slithering down the back of my neck and trickling over my wrist. I shiver, ducking into a nearby shop doorway. I shove my free hand into my pocket.

The rain plummets from the sky, obscuring the world around it, dripping in clumps from the tip of the shop roof. It splashes an inch away from my foot.

" _What are you doing? Jug?"_

Archie's words spoken in rain like this echoes like a ghost. I stare out into the skeleton of raindrops. They trail down in the shape of twig thin bones and drip onto the concrete like blood.

I hate rain.

" _Wait! You can't! Where are you going?"_

"I'm not going anywhere," I mutter underneath my breath, my voice croaking. The words linger on my lips like a regret. The words I should have said to Archie. The ones I should have said to Betty.

"Huh?" Kevin's voice is an echo in my ear. "What?"

My free hand scrunches into a fist. My eyes fixate on the rain, watching the way it distorts the truth. How easily it could hide Betty's disappearance. How it could hold the answers.

"Yeah, uh, nothing," I shake away my temporary delusion, cracking my knuckles, stretching my fingers out again. I feel a sinking reality set into my stomach. "You know what, it doesn't matter, I'll just-"

My words falter.

There's a shimmering of colour through the rain. I catch a glimpse of it just as I turn away. A strip, a curve, hovering in the sky above the roofs of houses and buildings in the distance.

A rainbow. Rain's natural enemy. The epitome of using adversity for the better. The thing that inspires stupid, inspirational quotes like "To get to the rainbow, you have to go through the rain."

But do you know what rainbows also have?

I smirk.

Leprechauns.

"Jughead?" Kevin's voice is cautious on the other end of the phone.

"Scratch asking your dad," I say confidently, fumbling with one hand with my backpack and pulling out a single scrap of paper. The torn photograph snagged from Archie's office. The exact replica of the missing poster photo. Except this one is creased. And shiny. And the original.

And notably stolen with ease.

"There are other ways," I say slowly, coyly. I can almost hear Kevin's apprehension in my ear. "To get a hold of it."


	5. Into the woods

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the love, everyone. It means so much that you're enjoying this story as much as I am with writing it!  
> And to all those who commented, shared and gave kudos, this one's for you!

Anyone who has ever walked into a wood and said that it was peaceful was lying. Dead leaves crack under my feet as I piece my way through the forest. It has only just slipped into evening outside these woods, but inside it is the dead of night. Black dark and dancing with shadows. A host of sins can be hidden under the dark shade of these trees.

I sniff in a puff of air and crunch my way through the forest of Riverdale. The hand gripping my flashlight is cold. The last time I saw them, my knuckles were white. Next time, I'll wear gloves.

My mind skips over Betty. I imagine her rummaging through these woods, hands wet from dew and scarred from thorns. She runs, tripping over tangled roots, blonde ponytail whipping out behind her as she casts terrified glances over her shoulder. Did she feel the need to escape into these woods that night? Was she running away from something? Did she even come in here at all?

I keep a firm grip on my flashlight as I continue through.

Winter, as the practiced hand it is, has killed these trees. They are bare and stripped of leaves. Yet everything within them throbs with life. The fingers of weeds twist around my legs as I kick through them. They leave slithering wet patches on the calves of my jeans. Branches collapse in front of my eyes; bony, waving arms. I tug them away with my bare hand. Their nettles sting.

A bush rustles nearby. It's either the wind or the disturbance of some nocturnal animal. I pass my flashlight over it before swooping it high above my head. The light tumbles over the cemetery of trees and catches sight of a tawny owl. It's beady eyes watch me with unflinching certainty, perched on a high branch. Then it ripples its feathers and takes off. It's thick wings sound like the wind itself.

I sigh, picking up the pace again. Riverdale woods has never exactly been my favourite place. It creaks with evil intent. The epitome of a Disney Villain's lair.

If I wasn't so damn freezing, I would cackle just to test the echo in this place.

"I am  _not_ stealing Betty's case file," Kevin had insisted the second I'd suggested my plan to him. He had stood the most resolutely I had ever seen him, arms folded taut across his chest, his expression uncompromising.

"Buzz kill," I'd scoffed, loose eyes rolling over to him. He had merely grumbled back. It had been a good plan. Distract Sheriff Keller, sneak into his office and lift the file with ease.

But Kevin, ever the killjoy, had immediately refused. "Last time I checked, Jughead," he had offered behind me, rifling through papers and stray newspaper clippings across a library table. It had sounded like a rustling breath. For a moment, I had almost imagined it was Betty. "Stealing is  _illegal_."

In that moment, I had been mid shoving the next newspaper article – in a series of articles – into the photocopier. As soon as I had dropped the lid and stabbed the same repetitive buttons, the machine had churned to life, alighting in the dark room. "Last time  _I_  checked," I had said bitterly. The glow from the photocopier had shot across the paper like lighting skidding across ice. "In all fifty states, police reports are considered public record. Or is Riverdale not part of America anymore?" The machine had then spit out a copy of another thousand words on the disappearance of Betty Cooper.

Kevin had immediately inhaled beside me. His jaw had clicked, unhooking, chewing on his words. But then his shoulders had heaved, he'd sighed deeply and then returned to rummaging through Riverdale Library's archive of newspapers.

Without a glance, I had grabbed the new colourless photocopy, stained with ink blots - the produce of an old photocopier - and thrown it onto the ever growing pile of others.

A tree groans in the wind beside me. It's mourning the newspaper clutched in my hand – or more accurately, the wood that was sacrificed to print it onto. The breeze kicks at the corners of the paper and I grip to keep a hold of it. I shine my flashlight on it's front page.

For his credit, it had been Kevin's idea to go to Riverdale's literary archive in the first place. If anyone could match the thoroughness of a police officer, it was Alice Cooper. Amid gathering the words from her cemetery of grief – a collection of newspapers spanning six years – via the form of an old photocopier, I had picked up another article, unaware of it's weighted significance.

It had hung from my fingers as if it were made from liquid metal. It was as if it knew itself before I did. In thick, black ink, it had declared its publication date across the top of the page;  **September 9** **th** **, 2018**. Three days after Betty's disappearance.

The wind of it had slumped me back against the photocopier, my ears hearing the old machine rattle against the wall. Clutching the six year old paper as if it held the secrets of the world, my eyes had scanned the words fervently. It had felt like I was reading them for the first time.

_Betty Cooper. Sixteen. Missing._

All my feelings had sunken into the tips of my fingers. So these were the words that broke my heart.

It's all words I've seen before, printed in every other news report. They're not unique. Far from it. In fact, they're achingly repetitive, a nagging throbbing in the back of the skull. A constant reminder of my failures.

And yet these ones, that specific utterance of them, are the most painful of them all. Because that article is the first place I had ever read them in.

I had sprinted into The Riverdale Register office the day of its publication with a desperate determination that my shaking fingers and tear spiked eyes were incapable of. A fresh copy of the newspaper was grasped in my hand, nails biting into the words I had just read. I had been planning, I was going to insist that the Coopers hire me. Or I would do it for free, I didn't care. All I needed was this. A place to fight for Betty. A way that was beyond searching. Beyond the confines of the Red and Black.

Alexander Hamilton had used words to write his way into America, to completely revolutionise it. Charles Dickens pulled himself out of poverty with his words. Why couldn't I do the same? Why couldn't I change everything?

But my tongue, suddenly void of  _any_  words, had faltered the second I'd stumbled into the room. And had found Mayor McCall standing over Alice Cooper's desk, an adamant sternness in her face, broken only by the crack of concern. "You're too  _close_  to this, Alice," the Mayor had said authoritatively, pressing the latest copy of The Riverdale Register on the desk in front of her. "I think it would be best if you step back from reporting for a while-"

Alice's face had split open then as if she had been struck by lightning. She had slammed to her feet, snatching the newspaper from under Mayor McCall's fingers and had yelled, "She's  _my_  daughter!" her voice cracked with conviction. "If I'm not going to do it, who is?!-"

Her words had stumbled into a mess of sobs. Even as Mayor McCall had reached forward with a steady hand to rest it against her shoulder, Alice had batted it away. It was the pure insistence that she was strong. That she would stay that way. If all for the love of a daughter.

I couldn't take that away from her.

And so, with a choke of a breath, I had dropped away from the door.

Now I stare at another article written by the same, fearless woman. It's in the latest release of The Riverdale Register, a copy that I had picked up from a nearby newsagents as Kevin and I had left the library.

**Abandoned house to be knocked down.**

It's not the front page article. It's not even in the first couple pages. I'm pretty sure it's a filler article. But it's importance weighs on more than the paper.

 _News of the delinquent cabin in Riverdale Woods set to be knocked down next month was met with rage from locals,_ it reads.

"Why would anyone care about an old cabin?" Kevin had muttered when he'd first spotted the article.

"I don't know," I had snorted sarcastically, rubbing my forehead with two fingers out of exhaustion. "Maybe because it's a hide out to smoke weed?"

Not that I've had much experience. Remotely smoking anything makes me choke.

Which was what my breath had done the second I'd read the rest of the remainder of the article.

 _'The cabin has been abandoned for many years,'_ my eyes skim over the bold, black words once again, _'leading people to speculate whether it had any involvement in the disappearance of Riverdale local Betty Cooper who went missing in September 2018. There has been no further information on whether this has been investigated as a line of enquiry by the police.'_

Whether it has been investigated by the police is irrelevant, especially if they won't tell me – or anyone. And, if I can find the place in the midst of this thick, twisting forest, investigating it is what I'm about to do just about now.

And right about now, Kevin should be speaking to the Coopers.

"So," his voice had hung in the void between us, a space filled with street lamps and newly photocopied. I had rolled my head to look at him from the corner of my eye. In the light of passing cars, I had caught him batting away an irritating stray hair falling in front of his face. "What's the plan now? After this?"

I couldn't tell if he'd meant after that moment or after I'm done returning to Riverdale. After my father's funeral is finished. After I leave town again.

I had pretended he'd meant the former.

"I guess," I had heaved a sigh, sticking my two hands into my pockets and staring out into the street, "I was thinking of paying a visit to the Coopers."

"Hold up." Kevin had swivelled around, photocopies crinkling underneath his arm as his eyes had trained on me. I could almost feel the horror in them. "You're not actually thinking of talking to them your _self_ , are you?"

 _Yes,_ I had blinked at him, my eyelids weighed down by the extreme satire in my gaze,  _Isn't that how these things work?_

Apparently not. Because the next thing Kevin did was scoff. "Sorry to break it to you but I don't really think you're everyone's favourite guy right now. Especially not theirs."

I had rolled my eyes. I've heard that insult before. "Gee, thanks," I'd muttered sarcastically.

But Kevin was right. As much as I'd wanted to argue, he had a point. Alice and Hal Cooper would do anything for their daughter. But anything didn't include divulging information to the man they think did something to her.

I cast the beam of my flashlight up again. The trees have begun to dwindle, scattering to make way for a clearing. I catch the distant glimpse of my light reflecting in a window. The cabin is up ahead.

I take a step forward.

At least I won't be completely blind to what Kevin and the Coopers are talking about. Reluctant as I had been, I had lifted my portable recorder out of my backpack before he'd left. "At least take this with you," I had bounced it in my hand before handing it over to Kevin. His fingers had reluctantly reached out to take it and he had stared at it for a long moment as if I'd just handed him a still throbbing heart. I'd watch him for a long, slow blink. "Just point the microphone towards the thing you want to record and press the on button."

"I got it," he had saluted me with it before tucking it behind him.

My stare had bored holes into him. "Don't ever do that again,"

He had grinned back sheepishly, a dusty apology in his eye.

Kicking straggling weeds, I stumble out from between the trees. The evening light has been allowed to seep into this clearing, casting a rose gold glow across the wet grass. I'm not brave enough to switch off my flashlight.

Squelching through the grass, I pace towards the looming cabin. It creaks in the wind, wooden beams barely keeping it upright. No wonder it's going to get knocked down.

Pacing past a crude  _No Trespassing_ sign stabbed into the earth, I jog up the steps. They groan underneath my weight. I reach the front door. It sits ajar, squeaking as the breeze bats at it. I don't bother knocking.

The door opens with ease. The wood feels slimy with moss. With a flick of my flashlight inside it's dark abyss, I step inside.

The wind sounds a world away in here. Graffiti smears the wooden walls, garish colours contrasting with the dank, dirty air in here. I creep through the hallway, dusting the beam of my flashlight over every surface. I'm not sure what I'm expecting to find in here. A hidden clue hiding in a hallway. A letter sitting on a side table. A neon sign that flashes  _'Betty was here'_.

I mock my own stupidity.

My feet creak through every room, surveying, imagining. Hoping. I pull out my polaroid camera and snap photographs. They shudder out of the machine, framing pictures of each room, each angle, each interesting detail.

Potential memories whistle in here. Betty shivering in a corner, hiding away. Or maybe setting a fire in the fireplace, waiting for someone to steal her away for a better life.

Or maybe she never came here at all.

I hear a mouse scratching in a faraway corner of the house. Passing through into the bedroom, I lift my camera up to take a photo. The metal beamed bed standing in the middle of the room, void of a mattress, is incredibly unnerving. I step in closer, a floorboard heaving underneath my weight.

Behind the door stands a dresser, cluttered in debris and dust. I reach over and drag out one of the drawers. It's empty but it screeches as it's being opened. I push it back into place.

A rat scurries across the floor as I take another step further into the room. A cracked mirror hangs above the bed, splitting my hazy reflection into two. Piecing my way towards it, I rub away at the grime covering it with my sleeve. It just seems to smudge the dirt around in circles.

Lovely.

Stepping back, I take one more glance around the room. This feels hopeless. A tired, fruitless venture.

With a slump of my shoulders, I thump back towards the door.

And then I see the floor.

It's divided into two colours. Hovering my flashlight, the glow catches the different stains in the wood. Most of the floor is a dark, muddy brown, worn and cracked. Yet hidden next to the wall is a perfect rectangle of pale, unvarnished wood.

Right next to and in the perfect size of the dresser.

In a fit of motivation, I throw my flashlight behind me, letting it bounce on the wooden floor and roll under the bed, and reach for the dresser. With a heave, I push it, hearing it grate against the floor as it occupies the unvarnished rectangle of floorboards.

Scrambling for my flashlight, I dart it over the newly uncovered patch of wall and crouch down. My surveying eyes catch on a faint shadow. I reach out with my finger. And I graze over the etched carving of a crown.


	6. Polly

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter took my a while to craft but I'm pretty pleased with it. Hope you enjoy!
> 
> The next update won't be until two weeks time as I'm away for work and holidays next week. But I'll get back into weekly updates as soon as I can.
> 
> Happy (late?) thanksgiving to all my American friends and readers!

There are often times when Kevin is be able to forget about his best friend. He mulls his life away, distracting himself with mundane chores and odd jobs and he fills up his head so much that there isn't enough room to remember her in.

Betty used to take up so much space in his life. The childhood friend he'd grown up with, the girl with a glint in her eye, who'd hook her arm through his as they paced through the halls of Riverdale High together and took on the whole world. One flick of her golden ponytail and magic would appear.

And then she'd disappeared. Taking a whole lot of him with her. And then he'd had to start imagining what life was supposed to be like without her. As if she hadn't ever existed.

So he doesn't.

Instead, he just lets himself be dragged through life. He glazes his eyes over, blocks out the world around him - the world void of Betty Cooper - and survives.

That is until he'd see Polly Cooper. She'd be lined up in grocery store, a child propped on her hip while the other ran circles around her. Or sitting on a park bench, watching the children play as she chatted to a couple of her friends, fresh coffee in her hand and a laugh on her lips.

And he'd, just for a second, catch a glimpse of the life Betty could have had. The life she could be having elsewhere. If he believes she's alive.

He doesn't think he does.

So, when the bell for POP's chimes and he bobs his head up from his booth, he can't help but, for a split second see a flash of blonde hair and imagine it's Betty.

"Sorry I'm late, Kevin," Polly apologises as she catches sight of him and hurries over, swinging her bag into the booth before following behind it. "The babysitter didn't turn up on time. Again."

She plops down with a heavy sigh, her bag thumping beside her. Rimmed with creases, her eyes are weary, her hair slung up into a messy bun. She licks her cracked lips once before smiling tiredly. Clearly, the twins are taking it out of her.

"Don't worry about it," Kevin assures her, trying on his best, winning smile. It's half hearted. Instead, he distracts himself by digging into his bag and pulling out Jughead's old portable recorder. He stares at it in his fist for a moment, not even sure how to breach the 'do you mind if I record you?' subject.

Kevin had contacted her about meeting up. She had been the first person he'd thought of, the one he was sure was the most willing. The easiest to approach. He hadn't failed to notice how Alice had developed a resentfulness towards Kevin's father, an instinctive reaction to the fact that Betty's case was unmoved for years. To Alice, that translated as the police not doing enough.

And Hal - Kevin is hoping Polly will be the bridge to him. He hasn't never looked quite right since Betty disappeared. Kevin has always caught him with a distant, sullen look in his eye. As if he were just a stuffed mannequin of himself.

No wonder the two of the had gotten a divorce. Betty's absence had driven a cavity into their hearts - and a canyon into their relationship.

Polly glances up at Kevin. There's a flicker of hopefulness in her eyes. A brief whisper of anticipation, pleading for Kevin's words to be, "We found something." But logically, it wouldn't be the Sheriff's son reporting to her on any new leads.

But where is there any logic in a world without Betty?

"I know we talked on the phone but," Kevin starts, not knowing how to breach the subject. He'd told her about the investigation - in not too much detail - over the phone but in person, it felt more real. More personal. Like he was balancing on a tightrope, "I just wanted to ask you a couple of things."

"Right," Polly's voice flickers to life, lilting upwards. But it fades quickly. "I found a couple of things." She busies herself rummaging through her bag and pulls out a wad of photographs.

For a minute, her hand hesitates before she passes them over to Kevin with a steady smile.

The weight of the memories land in his palm as Kevin takes a hold of them.

* * *

 

It's probably nothing. It's not as if the symbol of the crown is copyrighted. And even if it were, the Queen of England would definitely have a higher claim over it than I would.

Still. My breath hitches. My chest constricts. It  _feels_  like something. Like a message. A hidden clue. A fingerprint that Betty has left behind.

Something that I was meant to find.

With swift movement, I grab my polaroid camera and poise to take a photograph of the crown etched into the wall. The chipped grains of the wood where something hard and metallic cut into it. My finger clicks the button on the camera. The photograph churns out.

I imagine Sheriff Keller's disbelieving face as he'd stare at this photo, the supposed evidence of a six-year old mystery. He'd crinkle his eyes, look up at me in a mix of pity and amusement, and laugh.

I pull the photo out and carefully tuck it into my bag.

And the cabin alights with music. It blasts through the compact space like an explosive, echoes ricochet from wall to wall like a bullet. I curse, stumbling backwards into the metal railings of the bed frame. It's icy cold.

I swear.

The music continues to burn. I glare at my bag. The white glow from my cellphone infiltrates through the fabric. Why didn't I put that thing on silent?

Growling, I pull myself to my feet and grab my cellphone out of my bag. "Kevin," I swear at him under my breath, gripping the phone in my palm, "I told you not to call."

I flip the phone over. The screen flashes  **unknown**.

Okay. Not Kevin.

The light from my phone dazzles my eyes, the sun having dipped below the treeline. And darkness has begun to drip down the bedroom window. I hear it pitter-patter on the glass. Though that could also be attributed to the rain that has started to dribble outside.

With a hesitant thumb, I swipe across the screen to answer and lift the cellphone to my ear. "Hello?" I breathe out, hearing my voice reverberate around the room.

"Hey," a deep, worn voice replies on the other end of the line. "Is that Jughead?"

"That's me," I reply, unsure and dragging my words out.

"Hey," the voice repeats, having seemed to have relaxed. "It's Fred. Fred Andrews. Archie said you wanted to talk?"

I let out a breath of air. It rushes out of me like relief. "Oh. Yeah, hey Fred. Thanks for calling. Actually, I'm, uh. I'm a little busy right now." I glance around the room, steadying my gaze once again on the barely visible crown. The rain has begun to pour outside, the sound hollow as it batters against the window. I think I hear a screech in the distance. I hope it's the wind. "Do you think we could maybe meet up sometime?" My voice is raw in my throat. As if on instinct, the next suggestion flashes out of my mouth; "POP's?"

There's an eerily long pause on the other line; long enough for me to hear the aching creak of the house around me. It's as if it's shuffling, uncomfortable, trying to shove me out the door. Then Fred replies; "Sure."

The air rumbles around me. It shakes the house, the wind and rain batting at it's outer walls. It reminds me of how rickety this place is, how there is an impending demolishing noose hanging around it's neck.

I mutter my goodbyes to Fred on the other end of the phone line. I barely hear his reply. If this place, this cabin, has anything to do with Betty's disappearance I have to insure that it doesn't get knocked down.

"And hey, Jughead," Fred catches me, my mind swimming elsewhere, before I hang up. "I'm sorry about your dad."

I inhale. It brings me back to reality. "Yeah," I pause. For once, despite all the times I've heard it, the sentence weighs heavy on my chest. I'd almost forgotten I'd lost my dad as well as Betty. "Thanks."

I hang up the phone and let my arm drop to my side.

* * *

 

The raindrops tap repeatedly on the glass of POP's window as if they're trying to get Kevin's attention. He glances at them for a moment, watching the water slither down the glass and puddling at the bottom, street lamps and moonlight reflected in it, before he turns back towards Polly.

"This is my favourite one," her features crease with nostalgia as she gazes down at the photograph before passing it over to Kevin. Betty beams through the glossy picture, her blonde hair tousled as she hugs two little twins to her chest. Her eyes are alight and  _alive_ , even as one of the babies inquisitively tugs on her silver, heart necklace.

The portable recorder flashes red beside them on the table, churning as it records.

"That was on their first summer," Polly sighs wistfully, thumbing her own silver chain strung around her neck. Kevin catches a glint of a silver heart between her fingers, hanging from the chain. He ponders it. They must have had matching necklaces growing up. "Lizzie loved Betty. She was so good with them." Her eyes drop and Kevin knows; Polly wishes that Betty could be here to see them grow up. To watch them pack up and get ready for their first day of school. To share hand holding and birthday presents and special kisses only aunts could receive.

He wants to say  _I'm sorry_. To apologise for all the times that Betty has missed, for all the empty spaces where she should have been.

But Polly has heard those words a hundred thousand times before. They are uttered in the pitying looks of passers by as she walks to the shops, in the sorry smiles of would-be friends, the ones that are weighted with sympathy.

Kevin doesn't want to be another dumbbell dropped into her back.

So instead he breathes.

"Do you remember the last time you saw her?" He asks carefully, cushioning the question with a smile. His own voice sounds heavy in his head. "Betty," he clarifies, his hand wrapped around the microphone of the recorder.

Polly's eyes catch his for a second of alarm before she looks down at her hands. They're clutched onto each other. And she's started scraping off her peach pin nail polish with the edge of her thumbnail. "Yes," she sighs. Her eyes glaze over as if she's told this story a thousand times before. She doesn't wait for Kevin to ask her to elaborate. "It was the day before she disappeared. She asked me for help."

Kevin's tongue runs dry. His grip on the microphone tightens. He's never heard this story before. "Help?" he asks through a constricted throat. This feels like he's prying into Betty's past, unscrewing a door that's supposed to be bolted. A trickle of air runs down the back of his neck. It feels like her breath. "For what?"

Polly shakes her head, tendrils of her blonde hair collapsing over her eyes. She doesn't have enough will to replace them. "She didn't say. I don't know what it was, she said she wanted to tell me when we were alone."

"On the day she disappeared," Kevin finishes for her.

Polly nods, glancing up through her hair.

The air in POP's has suddenly run cold. Kevin feels it through the knitted wool of his sweater.

He hesitates as a thought hitches in his mind. "Did you know when she wanted to tell you? If she wanted to meet somewhere in private-?"

"I don't know anything," Polly cracks back defensively, snapping herself up against the back of the booth. "I just-" her voice snags in her throat. Instead of continuing, her hands move to rummage in her bag. For a moment, she freezes as if she's contemplating what she's about to do. Then she pulls out a worn, leather bound book and passes it to Kevin over the booth table.

"I found this," she croaks, not letting her eyes leave tattered, deep brown cover. As if her fingers are glued to its surface, she lets it hover there, her hand still clasped onto it before finally dropping it onto the table. "In a whole load of Betty's stuff Mom passed onto me. It's her diary."

Now Kevin is sure he's stopped breathing.

"I haven't had the courage to read it," Polly mutters. "I thought maybe you could."

He stretches out to take a hold of it and then pauses. He looks up at Polly in alarm. "Do you not think this is something you should give to the police?"

"No offence, Kevin, but I don't really trust your dad much at this moment," Polly sighs, letting her eyes rest on his. He sighs. "Besides," Betty's sister tries her hardest to smile. Her weariness is taking over her. "I think Betty would have wanted you to read it. You understood her."

Kevin falters. Clearly not well enough.

His fingers tentatively wrap around the soft, scratched leather of the diary, pulling it towards him. "How about we read it together?" he breathes, glancing up at Polly in a suggestion. He doesn't very much feel like the brave one right now?

A fleeting flash of fear crosses over her face for a brief moment. And then she nods.

The spine of the diary cracks as Kevin opens the to the first page.

* * *

 

My hair is dripping with rain as I tumble out of the woods, shoes sodden with mud and clothes soaked with water. Shivering, I pull back branches as I near the road. Raindrops fling from them as they're moved. My eyes squint as a bright, harsh light burns through the trees.

Blinking repeatedly, I stumble out of the edge of the woods, catching a glimpse of the familiar bus shelter – which looks incredibly tempting right now.

But my feet lurch to a stop, squelching in mud. The grass around my soles drips with it.

Because there, parked on the side of the road, directly in front of me, is a long, black car. Bright light glares from it's headlamps, the thick rain dancing in it.

I don't let whoever is in the car see my mouth go dry.

The windows of the car glide down with a high pitched whirr. I squint to see inside.

"So what has this got to do with the funeral?"

I stare into the blackness of the car. Archie.


	7. Diary

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Although this chapter was originally an incoherent mess, I'm actually really proud of it now. Hopefully, it will fulfil all your needs after that mess of a last episode. I'm still reeling.
> 
> Please enjoy!

The wipers wrestle in vain to swipe the rain from the parked car's windscreen, rubber squeaking against glass. I can barely hear myself think over the sound of a million raindrops hitting the windscreen all at once.

"My mom always told me never to get into a car with strangers," I say pointedly, decidedly staring straight ahead out the window, smothered with water as it is, instead of at Archie.

I feel him shift beside me, fingers flexing on the dormant steering wheel.

"I'm hardly a stranger, Jughead," he laughs under his breath but it's hollow and cracked. I still don't look at him.

"It sure feels like you are," I mutter under my breath, keeping it as low to my chest as possible. Yet, in this small, empty space, I'm so sure he can still hear it, echoing.

The night paints the trees black as if it is an artist brushing the world in a shade of darkness suiting its mood. Currently, the night is clearly resentful.

He acts as if he hasn't heard it.

"I know what you're up to, Jug," Archie sighs, his stiff fingers finally dropping from the steering wheel only to roll up and down his thighs. It's clear that the stiff fabric of his suit is itching his skin. It doesn't suit him.

Ever since I bumped him again, Archie has felt so distant. As if my eyesight has grown blurry when it used to be so clear. He used to be so readable, so predictable; a boy who wore his emotions on his face like a newspaper headline. Now here he is, a man, seated here in his car at the edge of a forest, doing something I'd never expected him to do; confronting me.

And I'd thought he was gullible and oblivious. How naïve of me.

"How did you find out?" I finally ask, voice low and abrasive, barely shifting my eyes to catch a glimpse of his shoulder. He's kept the lights inside the car switched off. I wonder what he's trying to hide.

Water soaks from my sodden clothes into the leather of the car seat. Droplets from the ends of my hair drip down to join them. It feels like I'm melting. I wonder if this is what the Wicked Witch of the West felt like when she melted at the end of the Wizard of Oz. I wonder if Riverdale sees me as its villain.

Archie rolls his eyes towards me, gaze dark, and for the first time he smiles. "I always notice when something's missing from my cork board."

* * *

" _September 5th, 2018_ "

Kevin Keller chokes on the words as he barely manages to make them audible. Polly leans in anxiously to hear him, hands taut on the table, expression both conflicted and steadfast. She knows she has to do this for Betty. She doesn't know if her heart can take it.

He raises his voice. Just a fraction. Just enough that it won't break.

" _Last night, I had a dream. It was weird. Archie was just standing there, stalk still in his garden. I was trying to talk to him. I couldn't get any reaction out of him, his eyes were this hollow colour and his skin was pale. It was as if he was dead._ "

Kevin takes a breath. He can almost hear the pen scratching against the journal's paper as Betty writes these words. Her voice swells in the air around him, forming the words that he speaks.

" _Then I turned around and everyone else was there. Mom and Pop and Veronica and Jughead and Polly._ "

He hears Polly hitch in a breath. Her fingers look ice cold. He debates on whether he should reach out and hold them.

" _They were all just standing there. Just like Archie. Frozen still and dead-like. I think my stress is getting to me._ "

He doesn't. Her fingers curl in on themselves, the ends of her nails biting into her skin. He distracts himself with the diary, wrinkled paper and all.

" _I'm going to head over to POP's. I need a milkshake._ "

"She used to have dreams all the time," Polly interrupts. Kevin's head bobs up to look at her. She's smiling wistfully, looking down at her half worn nail polish. Blonde streaks of hair fall in front of her face. "She'd mention them to me," Her eyes glaze over as they bounce over to the window, rain streaking down the glass. Her reflection is mournful and smeared. "She said she was recording them to publish into one of those dream diaries." A little bubble of a laugh chokes from her throat. It rolls down her skin like a tear.

Kevin looks back at her, the remnants of a sister that used to exist. Is she no longer a sister if there is no one left to be a sister to?

"Wait, no," Polly's face flashes towards him, expression falling. His feelings must be so vivid on his face. "Please don't take it personally. She didn't tell many people about it. I think it was a personal thing for her." Polly's eyes droop. A lot of things were personal to Betty. Even now, even how she disappeared. It's all personal. It's all secret.

Without asking Polly's permission, Kevin dips his head back towards the diary thumbing the page towards the next entry, the paper crinkling as he turns it.

" _September 6th, 2018_ "

Kevin's voice freezes.

"What?" Polly sounds panicked. "What does it say?"

He hesitates. Slowly, he looks up at the girl with the blonde hair and the life that Betty could have had. "Nothing," he croaks. It's as if Betty disappeared in the middle of a sentence. Stood up from her desk, diary fluttered open, and vanished; leaving the journal permanently agape never to be closed by her again. "It's empty."

* * *

Was this what it was like? If Betty had gotten into a car that night instead of choosing to run into the forest?

Archie's car rumbles underneath me as he drives through Riverdale. He shifts in his seat as he reaches forward to flick the radio on. It crackles and splutters to life, a spewing mess of white noise, before he resoundingly switches it off.

Would Betty have gotten into a car with someone she knew or were her secrets so precious that she'd be more inclined to accept a ride from a stranger?

I glower in my sticky wet clothes and dripping hair, studying the car's window and the rain that claims it.

A blur of buildings pass us, figures of people running in the rain with hoods pulled up and collars yanked over their heads. They're all black and dust, a smearing across the horizon. We whiz past them, Archie clearly breaking the speed limit for the town, wheels crackling against the road and-

There's a wisp of blonde hair. A flash of bright green eyes. A swing of a ponytail.

"Stop the car!" I croak.

"What?" Archie gawks, glancing back at me in a fit of shock. He doesn't move towards the breaks.

I slap him on the arm, frantic. "I said stop the car!"

"Okay!" he grunts. With a violent shrug, Archie slams on the brakes, the car shuddering to a stop. Even before it's wheels have halted, I snap off my seatbelt, push open the door and tumble out.

The rain drenches me.

_Betty._ I glance around wildly, my eyes a mess in their sockets. I saw her. I saw her somewhere.

In a distracted burst of conviction, I leap into a run. My feet slap against the drenched road. I dance around, throwing my gaze this way and that, desperately looking for her. Begging to find her.

"Betty!" I yell out, searching for that familiar flash of blonde hair.

Stray heads, those of whom are daring the wet weather, yank towards me. As if I've just uttered a forbidden word.

"Jughead!" Archie's car door slams closed as he climbs out, his red hair soaking into a deep auburn as the rain claims in. "What are you doing?"

My breathing sharpens, just for a moment, as the world blurs into its usual grey. And there is no spark of blonde in sight.

My shoulders droop. I look down at my hands. "Betty," I breathe out, a crumbling mess. What the hell am I doing? Of course she's not here. She's never here. She's not just been stashed away for six years, just to come striding out in her seventeen-year old skin, as perky and as beautiful as usual.

"Are you alright?" Archie's voice is close to me.

I glance up into his face. He's squelched his way from the car towards me without making a sound. Or my ears have been so clouded with my own thoughts I didn't here him.

"I'm fine," I growl under my breath, more at myself than at him.

His eyes flicker at our audience before returning to me. "Are you sure? Because you just-"

"I said," I say slowly, bitterly, spitting at him, "I'm fine."

And I swivel back towards the car, half deciding to walk home-

When there stands the flash of blonde.

"Jughead?"

* * *

Kevin rewinds the cassette again, worried that the old, recording machine will eat away at the tape inside it.

" _Do you remember?"_  he hears his own voice, crackling and cautious. He's always hated his voice in recordings. It makes him cringe. _"Did she take anything with her the day she-"_

" _Your dad asked the same thing,"_  the recording of Polly sighs. He can hear her breathing, slow and broken, even in this poor quality.  _"I don't- If she took anything, she didn't take much. Her phone?"_ She offers, as if that's obvious.

Betty would never leave without her phone.

Her phone has never been found.

" _It's just,"_  Kevin's voice is emboldened,  _"if_ this  _really mattered that much to her,"_ he glances down at the diary on POP's table, the one he'd held up at just that moment,  _"You'd think she would have taken it with her."_  If she was planning to run away.

Polly had had to leave. She'd only given a set time limit for the babysitter and didn't trust them to stay even until then. She'd packed up her things, offering some of the photos to Kevin – who'd refused – and had left with a promise that she'd speak to her dad. Convince him to speak.

She left the diary behind too.

With a sigh, Kevin presses down the rewind button, churning it further back.

" _Was it torn out? Is it missing?"_

" _I don't think so."_

He shakes his head. Not the right part.

He stabs down the button again. Voices sound so odd backwards.

" _She didn't tell many people about it. I think it was a personal thing for her."_

He flicks the rewind button further back.

" _I found this."_

He stops. Listens. Sets the portable recorder against the booth table, hesitating. This was the moment Polly showed him the diary.

Kevin, with a breath of resolution, reaches forward. And, decidedly, he rewinds further back, just before Polly's words about the diary were uttered.

And he hits record.

* * *

"Polly," I croak out, staring at the sister of Betty Cooper.

The young mother stares back, mouth tipped agape, strands of blonde hair soaked and clinging to her cheeks.

"Jughead," she breathes out. The knuckles on her hands whiten. She looks alarmed.

Before I can crack my mouth open to respond, to explain, to beg for- for something, her eyes harden and bubble and she sweeps past me.

I swivel to go after her but Archie's arm blocks me.

"Come on," he mutters under his breath warningly. He ushers me towards the car. As much as I want to resist him, I have no energy. I stumble through his orders. "We need to talk."

"You make it sound like we're going to break up," I sneer. My tone is lacklustre.

I'm still distracted by Polly.

Archie doesn't respond. Instead, he pats me on the back, steers me towards his vehicle and hurries me inside.

* * *

POP's is empty as Kevin paces, approaching the old man busying himself behind the counter.

"Hey there, Pop," he smiles calmly. The greying man glances up from his wet cloth, catching site of Kevin's eyes. He acts as if he hasn't heard a single word that has been uttered in this place.

"Kevin," he smiles back, eyes wrinkling with his usual kindness. "Can I get you something? Milkshake? Burger?"

"Actually," Kevin tries carefully, mincing his words. "I was looking for an answer to a question."

Pop looks anxious as he tries to cover it with one of his signature smiles. Kevin takes that as encouragement. Behind his back, he flicks on the portable recorder's switch. The tape swirls into life.

"Was Betty in here the day before she disappeared?"


	8. The Photograph

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, I know. It's been an age since I last updated. I was extremely busy over the festive period and never found any time to properly focus on this. I hope this extra-long chapter makes up to it.

Archie Andrews had imagined for a long time that he was the last person in the world who remembered Betty Cooper. Of course, her family still existed. Alice and Hal and Polly.

But that was different. They would continue, move on with their lives, forget about the daughter who disappeared. He had seen it happen with Polly, with the liveliness of her twins. How thoughts of them had filled up so much of her head that there was no space left for her sister.

And there was Jughead. But he'd abandoned her and therefore he'd forfeited his right to remember her.

But Archie would still be sat there in his room in Riverdale, watching the house across the lawn and remembering the girl who used to wake up in it.

Archie flicks on the kitchen light, rattling the house keys as he flings them onto the table. They collide with the wood in a metallic crash.

"Nothing's changed, huh?" a reluctant Jughead muses behind him, looming in the Andrew's kitchen doorway.

"A lot has changed," Archie answers cryptically as he turns to fill up the kettle. The water gushes from the sink's tap, a crack of sound in the silent room. He dips the kettle spout under it, feeling the weight of the water fill it up. As it reaches the top level, he cranks the tap closed. Silence returns. "Just not the house," he twists his head round to look at what remains of his friend, smiling tentatively.

"Make yourself at home," Archie finally says as he returns the kettle to its stand, flicking on the boiling switch. "I'll put on some coffee."

"I don't need anything to drink," Jughead mutters, a chair scraping as he lowers himself down into it. "Can't risk it being poisoned." His chuckle is low and distracted. It sounds like a joke; but there's a harshness in it that breaks in between them.

Archie shrugs. He leaves the kettle to boil anyway. It fizzes and rumbles, something to fill the silence with.

Archie takes his place in a seat opposite Jughead, leaning his arms over the table and twisting his fingers together. He creaks his mouth open; "So, are you going to tell me what's going on or do I have to guess?"

Jughead Jones, ever the elusive, simply quirks his eyebrow.

* * *

Kevin stares at the screen. The black and white image of Betty Cooper fizzles in and out of view. He lets out a skating breath. The date stutters in bright, white font at the bottom of the screen; September 5th 2018.

* * *

It's eerie being in a place so familiar. It's as if it's a hologram, a ghost, a shadow of itself. The blender still sits in the exact same place on the kitchen counter, the same number of knives still stabbed into the wooden knife block; nine. Always one away from a complete set.

Time really hasn't changed here.

I shrug in my soaked clothes, feeling the material cling to my skin. Denim is particularly uncomfortable when it's wet.

The water steams as Archie pours it into his mug. It hovers above the porcelain like a tendril of a ghost, before evaporating into the air. I watch with fleeting interest. I'm far more interested in other things.

"I suppose you took the photo then," Archie finally says, his tone more of a statement than a question. He's already assumed the truth.

I don't even need to question which photo he means. I feel the weight of it seeping out from my backpack where it's sat thumped against the leg of my chair.

Archie clearly isn't as oblivious as I'd thought.

Absentmindedly, I pull my soaked hat from my head and let it slop onto the kitchen table.

"Do you want it back?" I ask fleetingly, chewing the inside of my lip and not making a move to retrieve it. It feels like a challenge. I don't waver.

Archie stares back at me, his expression unwavering. He lifts his mug to his lips and sips for far to long before resting it back on the table. The porcelain chinks as it hits the wood. The sound itself is intimidating. "You haven't looked at the note?"

A bare flicker of bewilderment creases his eyebrows before he wipes it away decisively.

My tongue runs dry. A kind of gritty sandpaper. I narrow my eyes at Archie, feeling suspicion run up the back of his neck like spiders. "What note?" My voice sounds strangled. I feel my fingers tense under the table.

Across the table, Archie looks at me for a long moment before he finally speaks carefully; "The one on the back of the photograph."

* * *

Kevin has never felt so haunted in his life. The chair squeaks as he drops down into it, his eyes desperate to lean in closer to the screen. Holding his breath – as if the act of breathing could cause him to miss something – Kevin watches the CCTV footage intently.

The camera, angled downwards towards the front door of POP's, swivels gratingly inside the diner and catching every so often. Kevin wonders why POP hadn't invested in better equipment, especially after what had happened to Fred Andrews.

For a moment, it looks uneventful. Pop sloshes a mop out from a bucket, swiping it along the checkered floor in big strides. He passes empty booths, washing sauce stains from the floor and clearing away empty milkshake glasses from a nearby table.

The diner is empty.

Kevin wonders if it has always been this eerie and he hadn't ever noticed it before.

Pop leans on his mop, surveying the hollow diner with greying eyes. Seeming satisfied, he gathers the mop and bucket up with a clatter, dragging them back over to the counter.

He stops. His head pops up.

The door sweeps open. And Betty Cooper walks in.

* * *

The photograph drips from my fingers like liquid metal. I clutch onto it, denting it with my thumbs to stop the wind from stealing it. It has already taken the real Betty. It can't take this version of her too.

The air is aggressive outside Archie's house. It bites and gnaws at my already cold, wet skin, slithering down the back of my neck. I hiss at it, sharply pulling up the collar of my jacket only for the soaked material to slump back down.

"No, I  _didn't_ send it," I'd scoffed in disbelief when Archie had accused me. The photograph had apparently been slipped through his post box. It dropped onto his welcome mat – clean and pristine with a single, neatly placed postage stamp in the corner – precisely one week ago.

Which wasn't possible. It shouldn't exist.

"I have better things to do than torture people with fake notes," I'd croaked out defensively, skimming my thumb across the back of the photograph in disbelief. Across the bleeding, blue ink used to form letters. A cypher. A signature at the bottom. One that hauntingly resembled the name Betty.

It has to be fake. There's no way it could be real. Could there?

I skim my thumb across it again, feeling the grooves where the pen had scratched into the back of the photograph. Imagining Betty sitting somewhere, writing it determinately. Hiding a secret message in this secret code.

My wet fingerprint smudges part of the ink. It looks like a tear.

"Somebody's messing with you," I'd said resolutely, my eyes unable to unlock from the handwriting that looked so eerily like Betty's, just as Archie, at the same time, had said; "She's still alive, Jug. She has to be."

I had felt my heart plummet at that exact moment. I wish I could have been so sure.

Why  _wasn't_ I so sure?

After previous minutes of pacing the floor, he'd swivelled at that exact moment and slammed his palm onto the kitchen table.

I had stared into his wild eyes then. They were aggressive and untamed and  _hopeful_. When was the last time he'd  _stopped_  fighting for Betty?

"She has to be," he had repeated, his voice broken and cracked and slipping away. As quickly as it had slammed into mine, his gaze had fleeted away. For a moment, I'd almost felt sorry for him.

The tree outside Archie's house creaks. It feels like it's taunting me. Sneering and waving and existing. I glance up at it looming over me, the branches wild and contorted. It reminds me of the woods.

Leaves have departed it just as I would have. I snort under my breath.

I feel for the photograph firmly in my hand, needing to securely tuck it back into my bag. I'd asked Archie if I could keep it – to which he'd responded with, "You should have asked me that the first time." And so I'd proceeded to ask him if I could have the envelope it arrived in.

Apparently, Archie has developed some organisational skills. He'd murmured that he kept it at his office and he'd get it to me tomorrow.

I'd nodded once in response. I wasn't sure if he ever would.

Hefting to drop my bag from my shoulder, I turn to unzip it just as my eyes catch – through the gnarled branches of the tree – a window.

It's stark white against the night sky. A perfect ladder's distance away from the ground.

My breath shudders. An icy cold chill prickles my skin. I never realised I'd have this violent a reaction at seeing Betty's window again.

Pacing past the battering tree, I move to get a closer look. The curtains are shuttered closed. There is no light seeping through the fabric. For a moment, I can just visualise Betty – as young as beautiful as she always has been – swipe open the curtain with a laugh and yell down at me.

But she doesn't. The curtains stay still. They don't even rattle an inch. It's as if they are dead. As if the room is being hidden from the world. I don't even know if it  _is_ her room anymore.

Maybe it's been turned into a gym or a nursery or something else that wipes away the memory of her existence.

I breathe calmly through my nose. There's an ushering of silence, of an odd sense of peace here. The last piece of Betty that exists in the world. The wind whispers around me, repeating her name over and over and over again.

_Betty, Betty, Betty._

I wonder if she looked out this window the day she disappeared. Thought about who she was going to meet at the bus stop. Wondered about the implications of leaving that night. Thought about me.

"I did," her lilting voice murmurs beside my ear.

I spin around.

The night is dark. Empty except for the looming walls of Archie's house, the dim glow of the humming streetlights, and a tree.

She's not there.

I glance down at the photo in my hand. Of smiling Betty, eyes glowing with life and hope and freedom. She did think of me. She picked up her phone, pulled up my number and sent those three words;  _I love you_.

I gaze down at Betty in the picture. I breathe in her smile. My features wilt.

"I love you, too," I whisper into the air.

The air answers with the crack of a door opening.

I spin around, catching a glimpse of the Cooper's front door swinging open before I dive to the side of the house and out of sight.

Footsteps click along the porch, a steady, slow heartbeat of a rhythm. They sound like heels.

The footsteps stop. But the heartbeat doesn't. It's in my chest. Heaving nervously. I tell it to calm down.

For a moment, everything is silent. The porch light glimmers above a figure, casting a shadow behind it. I press my head back against the house wall. Just in case the figure turns around.

There's a brief rummaging in pockets. Then the click clicking of a lighter. A drag of a cigarette. A puff of smoke.

In any normal situation, this would be the time to leave. To disappear out of sight like Betty and never be discovered. But my intense curiosity tugs at me. Hisses at me that if I don't take advance of this, I'll never find out what happened to Betty. It comes in the form of my throbbing heart.

And so, I dare to move. To shift into the line of sight, curling around the side of the house, praying that the figure is facing away.

Alice stands on the porch of her house. Her straggly blonde hair billows out behind her, arms wrapped protectively around her ribs. Her nails are painted maroon red. Their chipped at the ends.

I duck back into the shadows. Just enough to stay hidden. To shade my face.

Alice rocks back on her heels, fidgeting with her fingers before she takes another drag of her cigarette. It's long and desperate. She's shaking.

There's a sharp curse under her breath. I can't tell if she's swearing at the world or at herself.

I would gladly swear with her.

Or talk to her. Or approach her.

I could. I could catch her off guard, ask her about Betty, try and get some answers.

Kevin's voice haunts me in my head, warning me it would just make her tense up. She would throw a guard up, tell me nothing. She doesn't trust me. She never has.

But this isn't about me. It isn't about her.

It's about Betty. Everything is about Betty. She is the reason I'm here.

I curse all sanity under my breath before I straighten myself up and ready myself to lunge into the light.

Until Alice turns around. She's gaunt. Her skin is pale, sunken into her skull. Her eyes are faded, her cheeks sucked in and shaded with grief.

I stumble back before she sees me.

She clicks her heels back across the porch, the front door scraping open. But before she strides back in, she flicks her cigarette into the air. In lands an inch from my feet.

The glow of the embers cut into the dark grass. It burns slow, the tobacco shrivelling as it's eaten up. I watch it transfixed.

I can't speak to her. Not yet. She's not ready.

Kevin's right.

And so, while the cigarette is still alight, I turn on my heel, collect my bag and stride back into the night.

* * *

"Why didn't you show me this?" Kevin flicks his head back towards his father in shock. Betty in the CCTV footage walks into POP's and finds herself a seat in a secluded booth. She smiles at Pop as he approaches, assuming to take her order, but she simply shakes her head.

As he walks away, she dips her head down, glancing at her phone. After a few minutes, she stares out of the window, flicking her gaze from window to door to window.

It's as if she's waiting for someone.

Kevin has watched this footage about three times. He knows that no one will come. She'll leave without buying anything or meeting anyone.

It's eerie seeing the past like this. Black and white, void of sound. It's as if he's intruding on her memories.

"Because you're not her family," Sheriff Keller says sharply from behind his son. The words sting. He's right. Kevin isn't her family. He neglected her too often to be considered even her friend. "I'm not obliged to show you anything."

Kevin smiles grimly. Fair enough.

" _But_ ," the Sheriff intercedes, raising his thick, grey eyebrows, "Because you were interrogating Pop – which you shouldn't have been, by the way. That man has been through enough – I figured you deserved to see it." The Sheriff pauses. "You were her friend after all."

No. Guilt grips him. It grabs his throat and squeezes. That's wrong. He wasn't a friend to her at all.

But instead of voicing the truth, Kevin, feeling a surge of realistic hope, simply states; " _Am_ her friend."

A single curl unfurls from his hair and falls over his face.

* * *

The trailer door creaks open with an eerie echo. Wincing, I reluctantly step into what is currently my home and close the door with a slam. The whole trailer seems to shudder.

Clicking the lock – and sure that it won't hold – I immediately yank off my coat and throwing over the first clean surface in sight. Well, relatively clean.

I yank up my sweater, the sodden material sticking to my skin as I try to pull it off. I need a shower. My skin feels cold and clammy. My chilly fingers zip down the fly on my jeans.

I move to tug them down when I stop.

I spot the pockets.

I swear sharply, sinking my hand into the pocket and pulling out the soaked poster.

"No, no, no, no," my throat lets out a low growl of frustration. I hurry to the nearby table, flicking on the nearest light and spread out the paper. The Andrews Construction Poster has completely bled through into Betty's Missing poster. I curse Fred for designing his logo with the colour red.

Throwing it aside in disgust, I reach for the missing poster. Red ink bleeds into the white page, black text from the underside of the poster showing through. Hissing at the rain and my cursed jeans – and stupidity for keeping it there in the first place – I delicately pry open the poster, careful not to rip it's weakened folds. I swear at myself for folding it in the first place.

I let out a breath of relief as I manage to flatten out the page.

The black text is smudged. The red ink blotch looks like blood.

Betty smiles out at me behind it. She looks harrowingly familiar.

"Wait a second," I gasp, spinning around frantically, diving for my bag. I haven't even noticed how cold I am without a shirt on.

Zipping open the back sharply, I quickly pluck out Archie's photograph – the one of Betty, the one with the cypher on the back. I hurry back to the table and hold it out next to the poster.

My breath shudders.

It's the exact same photograph.

Switches begin to click in my head. Like a machine turned back to life.

If Archie received this photograph in the mail a week ago – is there another copy out there? One that was here before Betty disappeared?

Or was this photograph, the one I grip in my hands, the original picture used to print the posters?

My fingers feel ghostly as I hold it. And wonder how many other hands have held it too.


	9. Interview

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A longer chapter than usual because I owe you guys. Sorry for the wait, it takes time to write this nonsense. This is not an understatement when I say comments and reviews really do make a difference. They keep me going and motivated to bring you the next chapter and the next and the next.

In the early hours of the morning, the world is dead. It is an empty wasteland, the only light it holds encased in dull streetlamps and a moon misted by cobweb clouds. It is as if nothing can exist alive at this hour. In sleep, Riverdale is deafeningly lonely.

And Kevin Keller is awake.

He can't sleep. His mind is too wild. It is here where his thoughts are the messiest.

Thoughts of her drip in his mind. Like an inconsistent leak in a tap, flicking sharp icicles of water onto the crown of his head.

Betty haunts him in black and white. The flickering fuzzy quality of a CCTV camera.

The last digital memory of her is trapped in that screen. Mundane and empty. An image sitting in his father's office, gathering dust.

He'd watched it. Caught sight of her stand up from her booth at POP's. Pick up her bag from the seat. Pace across the checkerboard floor. Pull her collar up against the weather. He'd been convinced, terrified, that she would suddenly jerk to a stop, crank her head round like a marionette and stare right at him.

Like she knew he was there watching her.

Like her soul hadn't quite disappeared. That it was trapped in this digital version of her.

In the semi darkness, between the sheets of his bed, the pages of Betty's diary crinkle open.

This feels invading. As if he's flicking through her thoughts like it's an encyclopaedia. Like he's playing a game of Operation and getting dangerously close to her heart. He brushes his thumb over the black inked words, indented with the pressure she wrote them with. The pages dusty and creased and hold a world of secrets.

He finds the first happy entry he can. Something to cling onto before this endless night of no sleep.

It's a page of dreams. Large, bold letters of _New York_ invade the top of the page, a stream of bullet points flowing out from underneath it. A meticulously planned out future – full of opportunities and excitement – that had involved both him and Veronica. One that they had all contributed to with careless imaginations.

What had become of those dreams? Veronica had left for the city, Betty had left everything, and Kevin had barely left his house.

The window shudders. The breeze rocks the glass. Kevin shivers, tugging the duvet of his bed up to his neck. He's always taken the silence of his apartment as comforting. Now it feels hollow and exposing. His eyes flicker around the bedroom, watching shifting shadows. He wonders if he's ever really been alone.

Kevin had found this apartment not long after he'd left high school. It was ideal; small enough to fit just him, large enough to store all his secrets.

It had been his way of separating himself from his father; distancing himself from the 'Sheriff's Son' label. Finding himself beyond that.

It was a decision to become something more than that.

And yet he still finds himself standing in front of a mirror, incessantly combing his hair to a glossy sheen, hoping to live up to his father's expectations.

Kevin blows out a breath, his eyes collapsing back to the diary. He should close it. Forget about Betty's thoughts and discover his own. Place it on his night stand, roll over into his duvet and fall asleep.

His fingers twitch.

He folds over the next page and begins to read.

* * *

There is a distinct moment between being asleep and awake that dreams seem deceptively real. Which is why, for the briefest of moments, I'm convinced I'm waking up next to Betty.

Her blonde hair is the loose threads of an unravelling tapestry on my bare shoulder. Her cool breath on my neck is the breeze creeping in through a mysterious crack in the wall. Her hands reaching out for mine are the twisting creases of my duvet.

I want to linger in it just for a second longer. To breathe it in as if it's real.

Instead, my dry eyes open. They're raw and tired. And awake.

The moment passes.

The trailer is empty and void. There is not a whisper of Betty.

I roll over on the bed. I imagine it to feel oddly warm.

Groggily, I push myself up onto my elbows. The digital clock flashes 05:54 am. Its red glow illuminates the ink stained missing poster hanging limply from a makeshift washing line over a nearby radiator. It had been my vain attempt to dry it overnight. Betty, red ink seeping into her hair, stares unblinking back at me.

It's as if she knows all my secrets. I scoff. It catches in my throat.

I let out a grunt, scrunching my face up as I fall back against the pillow.

My cell phone jolts. It rumbles on the nightstand. Starting, I let out a low growl, swearing at Kevin for phoning my so early and I fumble to grab it, so I can tell him that myself –

It isn't a phone call. Instead the harsh, bright screen declares that it is 6 am therefore time to get up. I grunt, my fingers too weak to keep a hold of the phone. It slips from my hands and thumps on the mattress.

In all the plans to return to Riverdale, I had forgotten to disengage my work alarm.

This time I swear at myself.

In a couple of hours, my boss will probably be ranting, forgetting that he'd granted me compassionate leave. In my hazy, half asleep state, I wonder how long it will take him to overheat without someone there to organise his files for him. I drag out a slow, lazy smile.

It's cut short by the alarm blaring even louder.

"Fine," I grumble hoarsely, grabbing for it. Defiantly, it slips off the side of the bed, thudding to the floor. Typical. Never making things easy for me. With a low sigh, I drag myself out of bed, my bare feet thumping on the cold, wooden floor. Snatching my phone to shut it up, I fumble through to the living room, kicking a stray beer can into a corner on the way.

The living room is just as eerie. The table is sprawled with the mess I had made last night; photocopies of newspaper reports flipped over to be repeatedly inked on the backs with copies of the cypher. I'd spent all last night imitating it onto what spare paper I could find, analysing a pattern, searching for familiarities in the curve of the symbols.

I swerve into the kitchenette, swinging open the fridge. A stench smacks me in the throat. I recoil, slamming it closed. Amid all my distractions, I had forgotten to replace all the rotting food.

Gagging, I stumble back through to the living room.

There is something so nostalgic about the pen strokes of the cypher. The shapes. Like I've seen it before.

I chew on the thought, dropping down onto the couch. Aimlessly, I thumb my cell phone, thinking of an excuse to go to POP's and get breakfast. My stomach grumbles.

My phone beeps with a reminder.

**Phone Fred**.

I blink at it. "Have I ever told you that you're a genius?" I praise, simultaneously thanking my former self for imputing the reminder and forgiving the phone for it's previous alarm. And I swing myself up from the sofa and stab the call button.

* * *

The hamburger crunches with satisfying delight as I bite into it. It's juicy and crisp and I wonder how I've lived without these so long.

POP's is dim with the early morning glow. It casts its shadow through the shutters, a ladder of lines streaming along the booth tables and dripping onto the floor. There's a swish of a mop behind me as Pop cleans the floors, his eyes ever so occasionally flicking over to his only customer this early in the morning. I feel his gaze trained on my back.

I sniff once out of habit and take another bite out of my burger.

There's a faint, running melody churning through the air. I wonder if Pop has turned on the old jukebox in the corner. The tune grinds as the record catches.

I look up from my burger. It almost slips from my hands. Betty Cooper sits across from me, her hair tugged into a ponytail, a smile wilting from her lips.

"Betty?" I almost choke. This place has done this to me before. I resist the urge to believe it's real.

_I wish we could just leave_.

The voice I hear isn't hers. It's soft and broken and an overused version of my own. It sounds like the record player.

_Just hop on a motorcycle and just leave Riverdale._

Betty's ghostly hands reach out to fall through mine. She flickers like the memory she is. My fingers stretch out to touch her arm. All they feel is the cold, worn table.

She dips her head. Her ponytail is limp. She fuzzes and fades like a static radio wave.

Maybe she did leave Riverdale. Just like we'd wished in these whispers. Between held hands and stolen kisses. Maybe she'd just forgotten to take me with her.

_Like Romeo and Juliet but we live happily ever after instead._

There's a shudder behind me. The napkins on the table flutter as the door swings open.

A dribble of grease escapes down my chin. I barely catch it with the back of my hand.

I snatch a glance back across the booth. It's empty. Betty's gone.

My shoulders droop with weight. Reality is so lucid here.

"Hey," a calm voice swings past me, a figure thumping down into the booth across from me. He smiles slowly, a trace of warmth caught in it. For the past six years, he must have been using up all the warmth in his body. It's resorted to draining the colour from the tips of his hair. "Sorry, bad timing," Fred Andrews motions to my half-eaten burger clearly questioning, with a quirk of his eyebrow, my choice of diet this early in the morning.

"No," I shake my head once, blinking away my momentary delusion and taking a large bite out of the burger before plopping it back onto the plate. I rub my hands together to wipe the grease off Fred leans back into the chair, the leather sighing as he sinks into it as if it's a mattress. His eyelids are drooping. I'd almost forgotten how early it is.

"Sorry for calling you here this early," I chew and swallow.

Fred scoffs kindly as if I couldn't have said anything more untrue. "Don't mention it." He looks on me as if I'm a second son. I cough uncomfortably. It's not something I'm used to.

"How's retirement going?" I ask casually, finding the instant need to change the topic.

Fred raises his thick eyebrows slowly, casting a heavy glance past the blinds and through the window. "Not as easy as everyone would let me to believe," he says cryptically, before he returns his gaze back at me, his eyes gentle and creasing with laughter. "How about you? How's the big city?"

I shrug jaggedly. "You know, work is work." The words spill out of my mouth too quick. "Actually, there was something I wanted talk to you about-"

"Oh, right, the funeral," Fred sits up a little straighter, weaving his worn, rough hands together, resting them on the edge of the table. Clearly his son hasn't let him in on the world's worst kept secret yet.

"Well, see," I chew on the inside of my cheek aimlessly, casting my gaze away thoughtfully, "We've decided to go in a different direction." This sounds like a job interview. "It's better if he's cremated. Less trouble." My voice trails off.

Fred nods understandably though his eyes simmer with confusion. The skin on his forehead creases in conflict. Or maybe that's just old age.

"I actually wanted to talk to you about something else." Instinctively, I shove my hand into my backpack and snatch out a wad of paper, my sharpie clipped to the top of it. I slide the pen off, unclipping the lid with my mouth and poising it onto the top sheet of paper.

Since I haven't been prepared enough to acquire my recorder back from Kevin yet, this is going to have to be old school.

I spit the pen lid out of my mouth.

"Can you tell me what happened the day Betty disappeared?"

* * *

"I was driving," Fred mutters, his fists flexing as if he's still holding onto the steering wheel six years later. "It was after a meeting with a client. I was heading home late."

The room sinks around me, swirling and twisting into a memory. It shifts and swirls, walls morphing into trees, the floor being replaced with tarmac. It glistens with wet puddles of moonlight in the darkness. We're seated in a booth near a bus stop at the edge of a forest.

A cold figure stands under the bus shelter, arms wrapped protectively around herself.

"It was, what, eight? Eight thirty?" Fred recounts, his greying hair caught in a brief breeze. It flutters like papers.

I nod silently, this information sounding familiar, as I scribble it down in fat, bold letters. A car zooms past on the opposite side of the road, its headlights scanning over us like searchlights. It kicks up a wind that tries to steal my note papers. I grip onto them sternly.

"I remember seeing Betty standing on the side of the road, at the bus stop," Fred hums in a minor key. His gaze is cast away from me, eyebrows knitted tightly together. "I thought it was odd she was out so late. I pulled up and asked her if she was okay."

"What was she wearing, do you remember?" my voice asks as my hand is preoccupied with taking notes.

Fred lets out a short, disheartened sigh. It's as if he wants to remember more than he can. "Oh, I don't know," he mutters, unsure. "A coat? Pink maybe? Red? It was dark."

The figure is pacing up and down the sidewalk, counting her steps, counting the time. She's wrapped up in her pink trench coat, hands buried in their deep pockets. She looks anxious.

Across from me, Fred's eyes, illuminated by a set of slowing headlights, glance up at me. It's as if he has just remembered a flicker of information. "She was looking at her phone."

The figure pulls out her cell phone from her pocket, the bright screen alighting her face with a cool glow.

_Her phone. She had her phone with her._

_She'd texted me from her phone._

An insistent thought snips at me. I repeatedly press the nub of my sharpie on the page, the ink soaking out like a drop of blood. "If it was dark," I say slowly, my voice deep and raspy. "How did you know it was Betty?"

Fred laces his fingers together, tapping one thumb on top of the other. "I guess," he says thoughtfully, "when I got close enough, I recognised her. My headlights were on." It's logical. Reasonable.

And yet he doesn't remember the colour of her coat.

I take one last glance up at the figure on the side of the road, her painted fingernail rapping anxiously on the back of her phone case. Her blonde hair swishes behind her. It's tied up in a ponytail.

Then the booth slips back into its usual surroundings like a glove is being put back on. Pop is still churning unusual music in the corner, the shiny floor is still glistening with patches of the early morning. My half-eaten burger still sits limply on my plate.

It's probably cold now. I mourn it.

"Thanks," I mumble satisfied as I finish the rest of my notes. I don't look up at him. "I think that's everything."

It's not everything.

Fred doesn't respond. Instead, he shifts back into his seat. I can almost hear him flick through his thoughts in his mind like an archive, like his organised filing cabinets. Mulling them over.

"Are you working on an article about this then?" Fred asks, curiously.

"Something like that," I mumble. I don't tell him the truth. He doesn't need to hear it.

Fred breathes out. Clearly, he knows he's not going to get any more information out of me. He shifts out of his seat, stretching, yawning. "Well, if you don't mind, I think I'm going to head-"

"Hey," I bob my head up, the thought springing in my mind. I cut him off. Fred looks at me, surprised. I don't react. "You didn't get any codes or photographs in the mail recently, did you?"

Fred's eyes crease with bewilderment. "No," he says slowly as if he has to think about it. That he may have mistaken something important like a photograph for junk mail. He still proceeds to shake his head. "No, I haven't."

I smile up at him. It's tight and strained. I don't know whether to believe him.

As Fred Andrews retreats out of POP's, I heave my eyes up, twisting around to call for an order of another hamburger from Pop. My gaze snags on a sheet of paper stuck on the wall beside the counter. A clean, pristine MISSING poster. Betty's eyes shine out.

A smile tugs on my lips. It's hopeful. Hope for the good left in this town. The good that is hidden in Pop.

He must have seen what I had been working on the last time I was here. He must have found the poster outside. Ripped it up. Pinned it up here.

Riverdale isn't as dead as it might seem.

Gazing, I focus on the picture, memorizing the familiar curve of Betty's face, the sweep of her blonde hair, the arch of her smile. And then I imagine it bleeding with red ink. My smile freezes on my face.

Wait.

I count my breaths. My eyes glaze over. Memories sift themselves through my brain.

Of photographs and missing posters and cyphers.

A scoff escapes from my mouth in one swift motion. I shake my head over and over again, shocked at my own stupidity.

Well, I've been idiotic.

Swiftly, I tug my phone out of my pocket. With a buzzing insistence in my brain, I whirl to my contacts and begin typing up a fervent text to Kevin.

**Library. Ten mins. Bring the recorder.**

 


	10. The Library

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just wanted to say a massive thank you to all my readers, commenters and followers. You have made writing this worthwhile. If I don’t respond to your comments, please know that I still appreciate them so much!
> 
> On another note, I have released a coda to TDOBC entitled The Reappearance of Riverdale. It is/will be a collection of oneshots and short stories from the perspective of characters not told in this story. Currently, Veronica’s first oneshot has been released to quell all the theorists who believe she is suspicious. 
> 
> Later important chapters WILL be released on TROR as plot points are introduced in this story. Believe me, you’re not going to want to miss it.
> 
> Otherwise, enjoy this extra long chapter!

The library door thuds behind me as if it's replicating my heart beat. It swings with a steady two beat rhythm. My feet thump to the same bass drum as I purposefully stride into the room, wooden floorboards aching under my weight.

The librarian, a silhouette of a woman, lifts her head from where she's shielded behind her desk. Her dark, tired eyes widen in suffering at the sight of a customer only five minutes after she's opened the door. With a pained expression, she shifts in her chair, the plastic creaking as she sighs into an attempted smile. Her computer churns loudly as it struggles to start up. No wonder she's not the perkiest in the morning. Somebody should really replace that machine. Then again, nothing new ever exists in Riverdale.

She passes me a weary glance, cracking her lips open; "Are you wanting-?" She nods her head lucidly in the direction of the door to the archive room, hand hoisting up a small pair of keys and swinging them between her fingers.

"I'm good," I say shortly, shaking my head once before swerving away. Clearly, she remembers Kevin and I from the other day. Or more accurately how much paper we used up in the photocopier.

Thankfully for her, I pride myself in being unpredictable. I don’t plan on destroying any more trees.

Determined, I divert my attention back to my task at hand and I dive into the first aisle. The bookshelves swallow me whole. They’re like a constricting cave, dark and unassuming. Towering above my head. Shadows lurch from the gaps between books, destroying every inch of dim light that manages to spill over the edges of the shelves. I stride forward, adjusting the backpack on my shoulder and thoroughly scour my eyes across the line of books on the nearest shelf, thrumming my index finger along each spine.

They’re cracked and creased with sticky tape and not one of them is the book that I need.

I let out a sharp sigh.

A gentle, ethereal laugh follows me.

My head whips back sharply. There’s nothing. Just two walls of dusty, worn books and the librarian sitting at her desk a distance away from the mouth of the aisle. Her head is bent and she’s clicking away at her computer keyboard, clearly engrossed in something far more important than my sanity.

A breath shivers from my lips. I only let it linger for one moment before I scoff and grit my teeth.

And I spin back around.

A pair of glossy, opal eyes stare back at me.

They glisten out from behind a shelf, peaking from above the tops of books. A lock of golden hair falls seemly in front of them.

I shudder where I stand. I blink. I breathe.

They're gone.

She’s gone.

My hand goes limp. We used to dance between these bookshelves; Betty and me. We’d hide away in here, originally with the plan to research for a Blue and Gold article or study for an exam. Except we’d end up being swept away into these exact aisles. Chasing each other between the shelves, peeking through cracks above novels, hiding behind pages, catching flirting glimpses of each other amongst it all. A smile. A dip of her eyelashes. A laugh. A sigh of satisfaction of living in this exact moment.

Of having each other to share these moments with.

Then she’d round a corner, I’d trace after her, and I’d scoop her up into my arms and kiss her.

My fingers feel numb. Useless I lift them up to pull out a heavy, hardback book, popping it open to any insignificant page. Here I am, left to scoop up any fleeting remains of her stored away within these books.

I stare down at the book, harsh lines of words printed across sharp, white pages. I read a few sentences with fleeting eyes. _When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth_.

How ironic. A Sherlock Holmes collection.

Any advice on finding a missing girlfriend, Mr Holmes? No, I didn’t think so.

I slam the book closed, a puff of dust coughing out into the air, and I shove it back onto the shelf.

I don’t have time for any of these books when it’s not the one I’m looking for.

Irritated with the mystery fiction section, I manoeuvre my way through the shelves like it’s a maze, tugging on misleading books as I pass. Because they’re tall and narrow and tucked away enough to façade as the title I’m looking for.

They’re not.

Instead, they’re a trail of breadcrumbs like in the story of Hansel and Gretel. Scattered tatters of disappointments assuring a pathway back to my sanity.

I tap into my mind, trying to locate the book in my memory. The time Betty had brought me here, led me to the exact location and snatched the book directly the shelf. She’d clutched it to her chest like it was a gasp of oxygen. The memory is dark in my mind, shaded by a black hood. It obscures details.

But I remember Betty in that moment. She was coarse and determined, knowing completely her mind and willing to open even a sliver of it up to me to share.

Passing by shelves upon insignificant shelves, searching for something recognisable, I pull myself into the children’s section. The wall of books stops being ominous and starts to resemble something familiar. I pluck at the tall, picture books, searching for a worn colour; blue and chipped.

They’re all frustratingly clean; with sharp edges and glossy covers. The newest things in this whole building.

I swear.

The door thumps again.

My head lifts. I tighten my shoulders, casting a glance across the aisle to the librarian who still sits at her desk. But instead of staring harrowingly at her computer, her body as shifted to look towards the direction of the obscured door. She smiles politely, her skin taught and tired, as the creaking of floorboards accompany echoing footsteps.

I angle myself against the shelf, plucking a book from it and popping open the pages, using it to camouflage my face. An artistic interpretation of an elephant stares back at me. It asks me if I want to share some cake. I sneer mockingly back at it.

“Can I help you?” The librarian hums in question, clearly addressing our new company. I scoff. If only she had afforded me such a luxury.

I scold myself for overreacting. It's probably just Kevin.

My phone buzzes violently in my pocket. I curse, hanging my hand down to grab it before it starts bursting with the dreaded theme tune.

I stab the answer button before I have a chance to check the caller’s name.

“What?” I hiss into the cell phone, manoeuvring myself away and out of earshot from any prying ears.

“You’re very cheery this morning,” Kevin sounds disconcerted on the other end of the line.

I sigh sharply. He acts as if he doesn’t hear it.

“Anyway,” Kevin mutters, clearly aware he isn’t going to get a response from me. “I’m going to be late. Sorry. I- got caught up with a lot of things.” Basically, he slept in.

“Okay,” I mutter thoughtfully. I’m distracted. The footsteps in the library have stopped. It’s hauntingly quiet once again.

Kevin’s voice is the starkest sound in this place. “I thought I’d better call. Make sure you don’t do anything irrational.”

“Like I would,” I scoff back sarcastically. It’s drained of colour. Preoccupied. My mind is fleeting over other things. There had been a part of me that had hoped the footsteps had belonged to Kevin. That he had miraculously arrived on time.

But if those footsteps didn’t belong to him, then-

“Hi, Jughead,” the voice is lilting and young. It rings with an air of melancholy. An animated smile.

I spin around, the hand holding my phone slipping from my ear. Kevin’s voice on the other end of the line is a distant noise. I stare. There, standing in front of me, at the edge of the aisle is a girl with glossy, dark locks, unseasonably ripped jeans and a pair of oversized neon green headphones swung around her neck.

A smile crashes out onto my face.

“Jellybean!” I grin wildly, impulsively catapulting towards her and scooping her into a crushing hug.

She splutters out a breath of air as if I’ve winded her, breaking it up with a cockled laugh. Tensing, she winces and groans, the way any sibling does when they cringe at any form of affection, complaining in a strained voice that she can’t breathe. After a suitably long embrace, I concede and drop my arms from around her and instead clutch her shoulders.

“Nice to see you too,” she bites on a smile, shoving my hands away defiantly and sticking hers instead inside the pockets of her hoodie. Yet her eyes are alight with a glow. “The guy at the diner said you’d be in here.”

“Why didn’t you text me?”

Jellybean shrugs; “I wanted to surprise you.”

“Mission Accomplished,” I coo playfully, which earns me a violent cringe from my sister.

Smiling, I gaze down at her, feeling a foreign lightness in my chest. It bats away at my uneasiness, flinging it across the court like it’s a tennis racket. For all the time we’d missed spending together, when she’d been shipped off with Mom and I’d been trapped in Riverdale, we’d made up for it when I’d moved back in. Mom saw my appearance as an opportunity to use me as a babysitter, to fit more work hours in. So, Jellybean and I had filled our evenings with classic movies and adventurous popcorn flavours and throwing them at each other across the room.

She had been the perfect distraction, the perfect remedy to the wound that was still left behind. The reminder of Riverdale, and Dad, and Betty.

“Stop growing,” I spout, smirking and reaching forward to ruffle the top of her hair.

Grimacing, she ducks under my hand and slaps it away. “You saw me at Christmas,” she glares, trying to keep her pout straight and unbroken with a smile.

With a laugh, I scoop an arm around her shoulder and swing us around to pace out between the bookshelves. The librarian smiles gently at us, clearly averting her attention back to her ancient computer screen so that we feel like we have some innate form of privacy. A fleeting thought skips over my mind. I should ask her about the book. If that computer system is good for anything, it better be excellent at finding desperately needed books for a six-year-old missing persons mystery.

But another question, persistent in its niggling, takes over.

“Where’s Mom?” I ask suddenly, tightening my arm around Jellybean’s shoulders and glancing around as if Mom will be lurking in a corner somewhere, her face buried in a book about parenting.

“Oh,” Jellybean grumbles quietly, her once cheery demeanour diminishing. I feel her shoulders sad; “She didn’t want to come. Said she couldn’t get the time off work.”

I snort. Of course, she didn’t come. She just let her sixteen-year-old daughter travel here all by herself to partake in her recently deceased father’s funeral. How responsible. I’ll be making a forceful call to her later.

“Don’t worry about it, Jug, I’m fine,” Jellybean tries to sound cheery again. “Anyway, the funeral’s tomorrow and I got here in time so-” _There’s nothing to worry about_ , is what she wants to say. I can hear it in her tone. The hopefulness that’s trying to chip through.

But her voice cracks before she can finish.

Because Jellybean didn’t spend as much time with Dad. And as much as she might try and deny it, as much as she might put a brave face on for Mom, she misses him. She misses him to her core and I’m not enough of a father substitute for her.

She shields her face with her waist length hair, trying to force on a smile. Her cheeks are reddening with threatening tears. I can see the thought of Dad’s death dawning on her, creeping up again like an unwanted weed. My hand twitches. I could dig into my wallet and pull out a twenty-dollar bill and tell her to treat herself with something at Pop’s. Or I could hand her the key to the trailer and tell her she can just chill out or sleep or try out the motorbike.

Because I have things to do. I have Kevin to meet and a book to find and my sanity to sift through.

But my hand halts. For the briefest of moments, inside the face of Jellybean, I see Betty. Young and alive and the same age as my sister. And I instantly know. The feeling plummets to the bottom of my stomach like a foundation stone. A universal truth.

There’s a sixteen-year-old girl that needs me more than Betty does right now.

And so, I cup my hand on Jellybean’s shoulder and say, as bravely as I can, “I miss him too, kid.”

Her smile wavers, turning to look at me as her eyes are glistening. Then, with the strongest of voices she can manage, she sparks back, “I’m not a kid.”

We laugh. It cracks and shakes but it’s still a laugh. And I’m glad for it.

* * *

Jellybean throws her bulging red rucksack through the door as soon as we reach the trailer. It collides with the cold, hard floor with a thwack. What has she got stored in there, illegal guns?

“Make yourself at home?” I suggest bravely as my younger sister pieces her way into the trailer and I flick on the light. It quivers like a buzzing firefly. Stepping into the groaning trailer, I close the door behind me, trying to soothe its aggressive creak. It really needs to be oiled.

The room is wistfully quiet. I can almost hear the dust whistling in the air.

“What is this, Jug?” Jellybean suddenly says, her voice slow and hushed.

I turn around quickly, finding my sister standing stalk still, staring at the suspect board, photographs and names crudely pinned on the wall. I’d added Archie’s polaroid and kept a space for the one I’d managed to snap of Fred this morning. Notes have been scrawled jaggedly on crumpled lined paper and stuck to the wall, as well as blood red yarn tying every clue together like a primitive spiderweb.

I pace forward, scooping up the streams of paper crowding the table and plucking the infamous cypher photograph to pocket it to a safer, less out in the open place. “Just a project I’m working on,” I say rapidly, forcing it to sound as casual as possible. I snap my gaze to her, my eyes dark and deliberate, “And not something you’re going to get involved in, okay?”

Jellybean sighs an okay and thumps down onto the couch, lolling her head back against a cushion.

I breathe out, moving my collected papers to a corner of the kitchen counter. “I know it’s pretty much junk,” I call out to her, busying myself with straightening up the pages and tucking up underneath a cabinet, “But if there’s anything here of Dad’s that you want – like as a memento or something – you can have it.”

I hear her hum from the other room. It’s wilted and in a minor key.

I pace back through to the living room, fully prepared to offer her something to eat or drink. But she’s collapsed on the couch, her eyes glazed over, her eyelids drooping. A second later, her breathing has become calm and steady and I can tell she’s fallen asleep.

Feeling a gentle smile tug on my lips and the innate feeling that I desperately care for my sister, I piece my way quietly through to the bed, pull up the duvet cover and carry it over into the living room. As silently as I can, I tuck it over Jellybean, the cover streaming over the sides of the sofa and step back. She must have had a long trip.

As soon as I’m sure she’s firmly asleep, I turn around, digging in my pocket for my cell phone and pacing across the floor to open the door to the trailer. Scrolling through my contacts, I step outside the trailer, close the door behind me and I stab Kevin’s name.

The phone rings hollowly in my ear. I’d texted him as I’d been leaving the library with a brief note of the change of plans. My mind had been distracted. Jellybean was kicking at her boots at the front door of the library while I had taken the chance to catch the librarian in a conversation.

It hadn’t gone exactly as planned. I’d stood there, asked politely and as briskly as I could whether the library stocked a Nancy Drew Secret Code Activity Book. The librarian had smiled grimly back at me, the thought of using the computer to search anything clearly torturing her. And maybe she just made up her answer. But she had clacked her fingers on the keys, hummed for a period too long, and then said the book was on loan. It had been on loan for the last six years.

In that exact moment, my mouth had dried like sandpaper.

Because if that was true, if the cypher on the back of the photograph matched the symbols in that book, then it is very likely Betty really could have written them.

And if she wrote them, I need to know what they say. I need to find out what she felt the need to tell Archie and not me. The feeling gnaws at me like I’m a raw fish.

"What is it?” Kevin answers the phone, his voice drowsy and tired.

I blink, scoffing. His voice pulls me back in to reality. “Have you been asleep?”

Kevin yawns on the other end of the line. “Wouldn’t you be if your ridiculously early morning plans had been cancelled?”

I don’t answer.

“What do you want, Jughead?” Kevin groans. It isn’t harsh.

I thrum my fingers on the pocket of my jeans, toying with how to word it. Because I need more than the recorder from Kevin now.

Lowering my voice, I cast my harsh gaze around the trailer park in case of any unwanted passer-by’s. And I say, as clearly and as hushed as I can; “I need you to break into the Cooper’s house.”


	11. Goodbyes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry (again) for the extended delays. Life has been extremely hectic lately and I haven't been in the headspace to write this. But I had a recent surge of motivation recently and managed to power through. Enjoy!

The painted sky was a rubbery red the day I left. Like the tangible wax of a Babybel, mouldable between my fingers. It hovered over Riverdale as if it were a shadow, determined to be remembered.

I had stared at it for one last time before climbing onto the bus out of town, feeling the vehicle jolt under my weight. In that moment, I swore to myself never to look upon that sky again.

Yet here I am, persistently lingering under that same sky, clad in a jagged suit jacket, staring at the urn that holds my father.

The wind is tenacious. It shakes trees and snakes through my trimmed hair to the same relentless rhythm of the rushing current of Sweetwater River.

The urn stands at a slant, balanced on an angular rock at the edge of the river. Water gushes and strangles the air, spitting out onto the shallow beach like a serpent's tongue before tumbling back in.

It is endless. Uncontrollable. The one thing in Riverdale that the North Side or the South Side cannot put any claim on.

It is about to take my father.

Jellybean shivers beside me in a pleated, leather skirt and oversized black hoodie. She wrings her fingers just as I twist mine around my limp, crown hat. I can almost hear her bones shaking. Instinctively, I move and wrap my arm securely around her, letting her lean into me. Only I can hear her breathy sobs.

The air cracks with silence. The space in which we are given permission to wallow in our grief. Trees rustle and water bubbles and I don't know whether they are mourning or rejoicing. They shudder as one. Bodies shift behind me. Branches crack under their feet. I twist my head around, catching a glimpse of those who have joined my father's funeral.

Fred has ducked his head, eyes dipped and greying. His black suit is jaded, worn, fading into grey at the seams. Archie stands beside him, stalk and somber, his own suit pristine and angled. He makes eye contact with me. I narrow mine back at him. It's weak and careful. A cautious appreciation. Archie drops his gaze out of sympathy.

A collection of Southside Serpents has gathered in the back, hanging their leather jackets loosely from their shoulders. Those who were still loyal to my father. Their numbers are scattered; obscured by the trees. My gaze passes over their faces. I recognise a few features. I don't study them too hard.

Then I spot her. Tucked underneath the low hanging branch of a nearby tree. Alice Cooper.

She is a silent lion. Her main of knotted, straw hair hangs around her pale, sallow face. Her muscles are taut, cheekbones are sharp. She stares out with fierce, broken eyes at the urn. She is unwavering.

I turn away swiftly. She isn't here to spite me. She is here for my father.

Just as I had expected her to be.

There's a low, hoarse cough. The Priest's eyes connect with mine as he ushers Jellybean and me forward. Jellybean moves bravely, pacing towards the shore. I follow closely behind her as the Priest scoops up the urn, the metal scraping against the rock. He balances it in my arms. The weight of it rocks uncertainly. I settle it against my chest.

Stepping forward, my feet sink into the gritty sand. Jellybean slides into pace beside me. Her arm hooks into mine. I breathe as steadily as I can. I try not think about my father.

I will cry if I do.

My breath shudders once as we reach the shore of Sweetwater River. The bubbling, unnerved water gushes. The sound of it smothers the breaths and whispers and sorrows of the distant people now behind us. Instead, all I hear is the overpowering sound of the current and the erratic tapping of my fingernails against the tarnished urn.

Jellybean looks up at me. Her smile is broken. I nod slowly, solemnly. I can feel my hollowed chest aching. She reaches towards me, hand hesitating before gripping hold of the lid of the urn, twisting and popping it off.

The ashes of our father sit stagnant at the bottom of the urn. I want to grip for Jellybean's hand. I will tip the urn if I do.

So, instead, we both step into the shallows of the river, the water slipping into our shoes. For a brief moment, I forget. My mind empties of Betty and the investigation and every little frustrating detail. Of Alice Cooper and Kevin who is currently in her house. Of the Sheriff and Fred and anyone else connected with the case. Instead, I think of my father.

With my sister beside me, the one who wishes she had known him better, I whisper; loud enough for only the wind to hear, "I'm sorry."

And we scatter our father's ashes into Sweetwater River. The wind scoops them up, showering them into the one changing thing in Riverdale. My father turns the water a grimy grey before being sweep away with the current.

* * *

"Sorry, it's such a mess," Polly sits disheartened as she scrubs in vain to wash off the crayon stains from Alice Cooper's otherwise pristine kitchen table.

"I shouldn't have turned up unannounced," Kevin Keller apologises as he shifts uncomfortably beside her. The twins spin around his knees, giggling and wrinkling their noses. They duck under the table legs, almost tripping Polly over, and squeal into the living room.

She sighs heavily, dropping the wet rag in defeat. "I'm so looking forward to Monday," the words drag out of her mouth in a low murmur. Kevin lets out an appreciative chuckle.

The house has become even duller than when Kevin had last stepped inside it. Instead of crisp, white walls, they are faded and stripped bare of photographs. Patches of wallpaper are left paler where the photo frames used to hang. The house was being prepared for renovation. That's how Polly had explained the missing frames to Kevin. They were removing the frames to strip the walls. That was four years ago now.

There's a crash from the living room. Polly's head snaps up, followed by Kevin's startled gaze. Polly's twins, Lizzie and Jason, are tumbled on the floor of the living room, the contents of their previously tidy toy box collapsed and strewn over the carpet. Lizzie blinks once at her mother before her face breaks out into a grin and her little hand grabs for her brother's, swiftly pulling him out of the room.

"Elizabeth! Jason!" Polly's voice cracks as she shouts at her children. "Get back here!"

There's a short giggle and then the tremble of footsteps running up the stairs. Polly sighs, exasperated. She stumbles forward into the living room, collapses to her knees and begins to scoop up the toys and throw them into the box. Plastic cracks against the side of the box.

"She reminds me of you," Kevin muses aloud, following behind to help her. Polly snaps her gaze to him almost like he's insulted her. Kevin laughs gently, picking up a robot made from Lego blocks and placing it into the toy box. "You were always so rebellious."

A short breath of air exhales from Polly's nose. She sighs, her shoulders collapsing. "Yeah," she concedes. There's a breath of a laugh before she leans back onto her ankles and closes her eyes to calm herself down.

"Do you want me to go?" Kevin suggests carefully. Jughead won't be happy without whatever book he's looking for. He won't be happy that Kevin had entered this building without smashing a window first. But sometimes the people that are here right now are more important than those that have been missing for six years.

"No," Polly breathes, decidedly. "I'll find you the box." She smiles at him bravely, collecting the rest of the toys and shoving the toy box into the corner, before she stretches to her feet and paces out of the room.

In the wake of her footsteps, Kevin collects his thoughts. He flexes his fingers against his palms. They're clammy with sweat. He's been thinking too much about his father. He's been thinking too much about the diary. The words he read in it.

The very diary thumps like a beating heart in the bag he has strewn across his shoulder. It's binding is pressed up against the plastic of the recorder.

Kevin didn't have the courage to leave the diary at home – out in the open, welcoming anyone to read its forbidden contents. His fingers tremble. He'd stayed up too late last night reading it.

First, it was for comfort; to remember Betty when she was happy and lively and looking forward to the future. And then it had turned to himself; his desire to be happy and lively and look forward to the future. And the contents of that diary were holding him back.

The possibilities within it.

The dread of knowing that Betty had seen what she did and could have written it all down in that diary.

And so, in a time that he should have been sleeping, he had curled the pages of the diary open and – instead of searching for Betty's name, he had searched for his own.

Kevin breathes, catching his reflection in a cracked mirror on the wall – one of the last things still clinging to the plaster. A coil of hair springs from his combed-back style. He swallows once, reaches up and watches himself tuck it behind his ear.

Seconds later, it pings back out.

* * *

The Whyte Wyrm smells like cigarettes and stale beer. It clings to the collar of my shirt like an unwanted memory. I shake it off with a tug.

I squeeze through the bar, twisting past two serpents cheering for my father, beers sloshing in the air and spraying over my shoulder. I shoot them a sharp gaze before shoving out of their way, the beer staining a dribble over my suit.

Pushing my way through the remainder of the bar, the people my father had left behind, I stride towards the foods table. It's a wooden bench smothered with half-devoured food from Pop's – an insisted donation – and alcohol dripping down the sides, into sticky puddles on the floor. At least I hope it's alcohol.

Jellybean reaches for a string of mini sausages and cheese on a stick and plops it in her mouth.

"You should go home," I mutter into her ear, steering her away from the foods table and towards the back door.

Jellybean recoils, jerking her elbow out of my grasp and returning to grab another cheese and sausage stick. They're distracting her from her tear stains. "And do what? Catch a bus back home? Waltz into Mom's and tell her, 'Funeral was great. Reception was crap. Wish you'd been there'?"

I let out a low, conceding growl.

"Please, Jug," she rolls her eyes up to me. Her mascara has been smeared away in a bathroom somewhere. "Let me figure out what I'm going to say to Mom first." She looks at me with a pleading sigh in her eyes.

I let out a scoff of a breath and nod sharply. "Fine," I agree. My gaze catches on a group of leather jackets stumbling through the room, a glass of alcohol slipping out of a hand, smashing on the floor. A sharp laughter. "But you shouldn't be  _here_." I place a fiercely protective hand on my sister's shoulder. She flinches but doesn't pull away. "At least go back to the trailer."

A long drag of a sigh tumbles out of her mouth.

"Jughead Jones," a voice quips behind me. My fingers tighten. Jellybean yelps and yanks herself out from my grip. "The prodigal returns."

I hum in a minor key, reaching for one of Jellybean's favourite sausage and cheese sticks, spinning the pick between my fingers before plopping it into my mouth. With one swift eye movement, I warn Jellybean not to move, before I slowly turn around.

"Sweet Pea," I breathe.

* * *

The cardboard box clatters as Polly drops it onto the dining table. "This is it," she breathes, regarding all her sister's belongings. Or what's left of it.

Kevin reaches forward, plucking at the corner of an old homework jotter, the corners rippled at the sides. All of Betty now fits inside a storage box. I drop the jotter with a sigh, letting it clatter back amongst her things.

"Well, what's left of it," Polly concedes, looking at the remnants of her sister. Her shoulders jerk before she stumbles back and shakes herself into busying away in the kitchen. "Mom decided to change Betty's room into a second room for the kids. For when they're old enough to have separate rooms." She laughs briefly, the shortest, breathiest of laughs before she's grabbing for a carrot out of the fridge and begins peeling it.

Kevin nods, smiling in understanding, before pulling back a chair at the table and lowering himself down into it. He pulls the box towards him. It doesn't protest. It glides across the table with ease. You'd think the memories of a person would weigh so much more than this.

"I saw Jughead the other day," Polly's voice echoes from the kitchen. She's topped peeling. She has cut the carrot to its core.

Kevin jerks his head up, his hands freezing in mid-air.

"Did you know he was in town?" she sounds like she's trying to make casual conversation. But it's gritty with resentment. Her knuckles are white where she grips the peeler.

Coughing once, Kevin unpeels his own tightened hand and reaches for the first item in the box. "Uh, yeah. I did."

She smiles tightly.

"Isn't it his dad's funeral today?" Kevin adds politely. It sounds disjointed.

Polly's blonde hair tumbles over her eyes. She nods once before pushing aside her decrepit carrot and starting on another one. Of course, she knows. Her mother told her. Jughead predicted it.

It is why Kevin is here now. Amongst Polly and Lizzie and Jason. Not around the mourning mother of a missing girl and woman who has just attended an old flames funeral.

"Does he," Polly tries to sound natural. Her tone is tight and coarse, "know about what you're doing? About Betty?"

Kevin pauses as he pulls out a stray collection of photographs that were plucked from Betty's vanity mirror. He closes his eyes briefly. How easy it would be for him to lie.

"Yes," he studies his hands, flexing and unflexing his fingers. They feel numb. "Actually… we're kind of doing this together."

There's a crack. Polly's second carrot has been snapped in half. Her face is now fully smothered by hair. "Oh," she says slowly.

Kevin is fully prepared for her to snap. To whip the peeler around on him and demand he get out of her house. Instead, she lifts a surprisingly steady hand, scoops half of her hair and tucks it behind her ear. She doesn't look at him. "I'm glad you told me."

Kevin mumbles a quick, "You deserve to know," before he continues fishing items out of Betty's box. A collection of CD's, an old MP3 player, a box of hair ties. They're odd items, empty of significance without their owner.

Another carrot comes out of the fridge. The peeler is clogging up with grubby orange peelings.

"Just so you know," Kevin adds as he finds his hand clasping around a thin book at the bottom of the box. He slowly pulls it out. It snags at the corners. "I don't think he did anything to her."

The book protests. Kevin grumbles, reaching in with his other hand to unhook the corners from the folds of the box. "Jughead, I mean."

Polly hums as if she's unsure. Kevin glances up. Third time lucky. Her carrot has been peeled perfectly this time.

Kevin tugs again once more at the book. It slides out with ease.

And there, in his hands, stamped on the first page with  **Property of Riverdale Library** , is the Nancy Drew Secret Code Activity Book.


	12. Family

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A chapter I absolutely love for it's character growth. It's probably one of my favourite chapters to date. I hope you all enjoy! As always, I adore kudos, bookmarks and comments! They always motivate me and are always appreciated!

The dusty burgundy curtain rattles on its rail above the doorway as Sweet Pea pushes past it into the back caverns of the Whyte Wyrm. Piecing after him, I grind the curtain aside, the moth-eaten velvet coming off in clumps in my hand. Apparently, Tall Boy had tumbled through the door one day in a drunken brawl, splintering it in half, and it had been cheaper to replace it with this scrappy piece of fabric than some actual, substantial hardware.

Sweet Pea's whiskey-soaked ice clinks in his glass like cracked marbles. He shoves the drink down onto a nearby surface, leans back against a rickety, chalky cabinet and, with arms taught across his chest, nods sharply at me and then at the curtain.

I eye him deliberately, steady and cautious before I sniff pointedly and cast a swift glance behind me. Jellybean hovers ten yards away on the other side of the doorway, still lingering near the buffet table, and chomping down on a slice of pizza. She cranks her eyes towards me as if she knows I'm watching. I pass her a warning look, a  _please just go back to the trailer_ look.

She sneers mockingly at me before proceeding to chew her pepperoni slice slowly and dramatically as if she's purposely trying to anger me.

I scoff once before grabbing the curtain and cracking it closed.

"So, this is your domain now, huh?" I muse aloud, turning back towards Sweet Pea who hasn't moved an inch from his commandeering pose. The wrinkles of his leather serpent jacket pucker like the jagged waves of Sweetwater river. A nerve twitches underneath his neck tattoo. "Leader of the Southside Serpents?" I pluck at an array of clutter that lines a nearby side table, fingers rubbing away a thin layer of dust. "You certainly got more from my father than I ever did."

"I'm not here to listen to you moping," Sweet Pea drawls, his shoulders sagging as he unhooks his arms from across his chest and reaches easily for his glass. Taking a long inhaling swig, he swallows before offering the glass to me. I shake my head shortly.

He shrugs once before downing the rest of the whiskey, swallowing hard and slamming the glass back down onto the table. "Listen," Sweet Pea stretches towards me and his voice sounds like cracking knuckles. "I've heard about what you're doing."

My eyes narrow instantly. I breathe heavily through my nose. Does the whole town know what I'm doing?

"I don't think it's a good idea," Sweet Pea's voice is low, coarse and hushed.

I click my tongue against the side of my cheek. "Are you threatening me?" I jeer pulling myself to my full height to combat his looming figure.

Sweet Pea scoffs, his face creasing in a short laugh. "No," his voice thrums smoothly. "I'm warning you," he says calmly, his voice stripped of any maliciousness. He relaxes his shoulders, leaning back again and eyeing me coolly from across the small room. He quirks an eyebrow. "You'd know if I was threatening you."

My eye twitches. My mouth is creased into a permanent scowl.

"I've seen what happens to people who try to take justice into their own hands," Sweet Pea purrs out the side of his mouth. He raises his eyebrows suggestively, leaning back against the cabinet, the old wood rattles against his broad shoulder blades.

I breathe out slowly, my fingers drumming against my palm. I can't tell if he's talking about Betty. I can't tell if he's talking about himself.

But before I can question him, he nods upwards at me, his eye sockets shadowed like jagged caverns. "Watch your back," he warns brutishly.

And, for the first time, as I eye him slowly, I find myself trusting someone.

And, with a nod, I turn around, yank the curtain open and stride out.

* * *

The dusty pages of the Nancy Drew activity book flick through Kevin Keller's fingers effortlessly. He had expected them to weigh like iron doors for all the weight they're supposed to hold. Instead, they're as light as feathers.

Jughead had sounded desperate on the phone. Insistent about what Kevin was required to find. The importance of it was critical. Kevin had convinced himself that he was looking for the holy grail.

Kevin lays the book aside, the flimsy cover flopping out of his hands.

He supposes a book was always that important to Betty.

A tumble of footsteps trill down the stairs. Polly sighs, dropping down into a chair on the other side of the dining table, watching her children race into the room. Her fingers scoop the blonde hair that has collapsed over her ears, threading them up over her forehead as she tugs on them in frustration.

"Polly," Kevin lifts his head up, peering at her from across the top of the cardboard box. Her face is worn, her skin showing the signs of stress without the father of her children. "If you… ever need help."

"I'm fine, Kevin," she says suddenly, snapping her gaze to mine. There's a silent pleading in them, a look of  _please don't ask_. It's strained and trapped behind a thousand locked doors.

But it's still there.

And so, he doesn't ask.

Instead, he returns to rummaging in the box of Betty's remains. He feels like he's pulling at her stray bones instead of odd, empty items from her bedroom. Useless items that now define her existence. He's found what he needed. It sits in front of him, staring limply at him, the leftovers of her life. He could easily just stand up right now, stride towards the door and go.

But he doesn't.

Because something tugs inside of him, insisting that he stay. Polly Cooper can't be alone right now.

So instead he pushes the box away from him. The cardboard grates against the wood of the dining table. What is left of Betty may be in that box but right now, in this moment, there is a more important Cooper to worry about.

He reaches his hand forward, a gentle offering of help. Polly drops her gaze to it, her eyes wavering. She squeezes them shut before biting down on her cracked bottom lip and forcing her tears away.

Then, in a swift movement, she reaches out and grabs his hand. She squeezes. He can almost feel her pulse.

"She can't-" Polly's voice is cracked, broken, hovering between silent sobs. "She can't take them away."

Kevin whips his head around as Lizzie and Jason giggle in a rush into the room. Her twins. Her children. He flashes his eyes back to Polly in a panic. His other hand shoots out and grabs for her free hand.

"Who?" Kevin asks, worried. Polly's heartbeat is throbbing. "Who's she?"

A single tear slides down her cheek. She lets her red rimmed eyes lift to meet his. Her cracked lips break apart like glass; "Cheryl."

* * *

"I can't believe you have no food," Jellybean heaves the remainder of the shopping bags onto the kitchen counter, balancing them with her hip. She grunts, almost ripping the flimsy plastic bag carrying the cans of soup and baked beans. "How do you  _live_?"

"POP's" I mutter incoherently as I scatter the polaroid photographs across the trailer's table. I sent Kevin a text swiftly after the funeral, asking him repeatedly if he found the Nancy Drew book. He hasn't replied, and his phone has decided to switch itself off and send me straight to voicemail. Because, obviously, he wouldn't be idiotic enough to switch it off himself.

So instead I'm focusing on his father.

"What are you looking for?" Jellybean muses aloud around a chunk of bread roll that's she's chewing. I stare at her pointedly, debating on whether to warn her about slowing metabolism and adulting.

Instead I shrug jaggedly and return to surveying the array of pictures. "A photograph," I answer cryptically, catching sight of the one I want, reaching forward and plucking it out from the pile. A polaroid of a carved crown in the wall of an abandoned house.

"I can see that," Jellybean frowns, fleeting her gaze over the array of photographs, her dark hair cascading over her face. She scoops a lump of it, tucking it behind her ear in defiance. "What for?"

I turn on her quickly, cautioning her with my eyes. "Remember when I said not to get involved?" My lips tighten. "Now's that time."

She huffs, glaring back at me, but doesn't retort. Instead, she hooks her arms over her chest, gnaws at the remainder of her bread roll and disappears into the bedroom.

Cracking my neck, a stiffness tightening in it, I gather up the rest of the photographs into a pile and tuck them into my bag. Sheriff Keller will need as much proof as I can shove down his throat.

* * *

Sheriff Keller glances at the polaroid, scoffs once and then flings it back at me.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Jones," he says, not sounding regretful at all as he stretches in the chair behind his desk, "But I don't have time for meaningless… graffiti."

"This isn't meaningless!" I lung forward, stabbing the photograph of the crown etching with my index finger, almost stabbing it into Sheriff Keller's desk.

He cracks his shoulder blades, narrowing his eyes at me. "Jughead," he says slowly and gravely, "I assure you that we have done all we can to find Miss. Cooper."

I growl low in my chest. My arm curls in on itself, polaroid securely between my fingers.

"But sometimes cases run cold," he sighs as if he's said these things a thousand times to a thousand different people. "I'm sorry."

I lick my lips in defiance. My eye twitches.

The cypher covered photograph throbs in my bag. I tighten my fist. I can't give it to him. If I give it to him, he'll squander it. He'll go down the wrong path. He'll think it's a prank.

And I'm so close.

So, instead, I perch myself on the back of the chair opposite his desk and, swiftly pulling out my notepaper and pen, click my tongue; "Then you won't mind me asking you a few questions?"

Sheriff Keller looks tired as he leans back into his chair, the plastic creaking underneath his weight, and weaves his fingers together against his stomach. "Go ahead," he drawls, his eyes shining with curiosity.

He lifts his greying eyebrows.

The side of my lip twitches.

* * *

"Who was Betty going to meet?" I ask, my breathing heavy through my nose. Every answer he's given me has been irritatingly vague. The equivalent of no comment. My lips are tight as I eye him. If I lunged for him now, would I go to court for assaulting a police officer?

"We don't know," Sheriff Keller shrugs regrettably, letting his gaze linger on me. "Unfortunately, that person has never come forward."

"You must have  _some_  clue," I say through gritted teeth.

Sheriff Keller is unfazed. He shakes his head in apology.

Scribbling another useless line of notes, my ink becoming more blotted and aggressive as I progress, I grumble. The pen nib almost punctures through the paper.

"Who was the bus driver that passed her that night?" I ground out the words, glancing my dark gaze back up to the Sheriff.

He hesitates.

Oh.  _Now_  we're getting somewhere.

"I can't tell you that," he says sincerely, his voice calm and temperate. "That would be putting our witness's anonymity into jeopardy."

I crank my jaw open. My grip tightens around my pen. I breathe through my nose.

"You can at  _least_  tell me which route the bus was going," I say. I sound like I'm pleading. I  _am_ pleading.

Sheriff's gaze breaks. He studies me, his eyes softening. He must see the heartbreak in my face. I try to smother it with a scowl.

He sighs coolly, evidently debating whether to tell me. Then, as if the words are smothered in butter, he says smoothly; "It was headed to Greendale."

There must be a crack in my expression as I jerk to scribble it down, because Sheriff Keller's lips quirk upwards briefly.

Then he's leaning forward, his fingers still interlocked and resting them on his desk. "Now, can I ask  _you_ a question?" he says. It sounds less like a question and more of statement.

I let my eyes darken. I say nothing.

He takes that as encouragement.

"Have you been talking to my son?" his voice isn't condemning. It simply states his suspicions.

I let out a breath through my nose. My eye twitches.

He lets out a cloudy laugh and leans back into his chair. His shoulders droop. "I thought so," he hums.

My eyes are watchful of him. "Why?"

"Jughead," Sheriff Keller says resolutely, looking at me with determination. There's a broken sadness in them that I hadn't noticed before. "Before you came into town, Kevin hadn't spoken to me in years."

My tongue dries. Oh.

"He had the exact same reaction to me as you did," he lets out a dry chuckle. It drains his voice.

"What do you mean?" I say, my voice tightening. My mind is wild. This. This is why Kevin was so reluctant to speak to his father the first time I'd asked him. This is why he's been so distant about him.

My lips hover into the shape of an 'o'.

Sheriff Keller sighs and this time his expression is hazy with real regret. He looks at me poignantly. "He hates me for never finding her."

* * *

For the first time, I feel numb. My fingers are barely clinging onto my notepaper as I step out from the police station. They shake as I fumble with the zip of my bag and drop the paper in.

Clouds hover overhead, a smothering of the sky, shadowing the earth.

My lips are dry. I tug my hand into my pocket and yank out my phone, frantically scroll through the contacts and stab the call button.

The line trills for a few beats. I tap my foot in nervous impatience.

"Jug?" Jellybean's voice is groggy, like she's just woken up from a sleep. She yawns, squeaking at the end like she always did when she was younger.

I let out a soft, breathy laugh. My fingers steady. The fact that her voice still exists helps me balance.

"Jughead?" She asks, more alert and anxious at my silence. "Is everything okay?"

"Jellybean," I say gently, a smile in my voice. I bite my bottom lip, screwing up my eyes, forcing away the stray tears. "I just wanted to call."

Jellybean scoffs. "Boo," she teases, groaning. But she sounds relieved.

I laugh, low in my throat. "And, uh, just wanted to tell you that," I hesitate before nodding myself into some sort of resolution, "I love you. You know that right?"

Jellybean makes a barfing sound on the other end of the line. I laugh sharply.

"Thanks," I splutter sarcastically. The wide smile on my face is a surprise.

Jellybean snorts on the other end of the line. Then, as I imagine her scrunching her face up in disgust, says, "And I love you too, Dummy."

And a shard of sunlight cracks through the clouds. 


	13. Promises

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We're getting closer and closer to the revelation. This chapter became twice as long as usual to try and cram everything I wanted into it. I hope you enjoy and, as always, I appreciate your comes and kudos and bookmarks!

Kevin's life has never felt so unimportant than it does in this moment. His fist feels numb as he lifts it up to rap it against the trailer door. He doesn't even feel the grating metal snag against the skin of his knuckles. Polly's voice haunts him. Her expression of cracking pain lingers like cobwebs. The desperation when she finally broke down.

Cheryl. Cheryl is trying to gain full custody of Polly's children. And he can do nothing to stop it.

The door to the trailer creaks open and he barely notices it. Instead, he's smothered by his ignorance. How he'd caught glimpses of Polly's life and had instantly determined that it was perfect. How wrong he was?

"Can I," a tired voice hangs out of the trailer doorway, "help you?"

Kevin's shoulders shudder as he tries to rattle away his thoughts before snapping his gaze upwards. A lanky, longhaired figure drapes out of the doorway, her hand scratching at the back of her head, skewing the headphones over her ears. She stares down at him with squinting eyes, her mouth mid yawn.

"Oh," he splutters, trying to hide his surprise with a stretched smile. He wasn't prepared to cover up his emotions today. Adjusting himself, he shuffles on his feet and fiddles with the strap of his satchel bag that has been digging into his shoulder. "You must be JB."

Jellybean's eyes are unmoving. He can't tell if she's unimpressed or just in a daze.

"I'm Kevin," he introduces himself to no reaction. Clearly, Jughead told him about his sister but had neglected to mention Kevin to her. "Uh, is Jughead in?"

Jellybean's dark, unbrushed hair snags on the splintered doorframe as she twists her head round to double check that Jughead hasn't suddenly reappeared. "Nope," she says shortly, turning her attention back to Kevin. This time she tries a smile. Kevin is relieved.

"Well," Kevin fiddles with the clasp of his bag, pulling it open and dragging out the portable tape recorder and the newly acquired Nancy Drew book. "Can I leave these here for him?" He pushes them over to Jellybean who squints at them for a moment before gathering them up in her arms.

She twists the activity book around in her hand, blinking at it once before spluttering out a laugh. "My brother has weird taste. Uh, thanks?" She smiles at Kevin before hesitating who assures her that that was all he needed, then proceeds to step back and close the door.

As soon as the door clicks closed, Kevin's thoughts are drowning him again.

And he wonders, for the first time, whether Betty got the better end of the deal to begin with.

* * *

The walk from the police station to the trailer park is never-ending.

The memory of Betty's fingers lingers in my hand. Her fingertips trace the creases of my palm and slide across the lines of my worn skin. She holds my hand as I stumble down the street. Eyes follow me, the gazes of curious onlookers. I snap irritated, broken stares at them. They cower like I want to. My stares snap, collapsing to the ground. I don't feel brave enough anymore.

Betty holds me up as I crumble. My fingers pass through air as they press against the skin of my own palm. My chest feels as empty as my hand does.

She fades like the memory she is. I try to close my eyes to capture her for just a minute longer. But the realisation sets in too soon. It's been creeping up on me recently. I've been so preoccupied with pointless questionings and investigations to notice it.

I've been feeling a lot less of her lately.

The truth has been trickling down my neck like thick treacle this whole time. I've been so distracted to pay it any attention.

I don't think she's coming back. My throat chokes on the thought.

My fingers flex, feeling no trace of her left there. I force away fierce tears.

I'm not any closer to finding her than I was when I left. Every possibility, every theory that has been passed in whispers throughout the years, of suicide or running away or a becoming a tragic victim of foul play. I'm not even close to ruling any of them out.

Frustration digs into the back of my skull. I snatch my hand away – as if Betty were even there to snatch it away from – and tug incessantly at the collar of my jacket as if it will provide a satisfactory hiding place. My fingers shudder. I force them to still.

A growl escapes the back of my throat. I push my feet to keep walking. They slap against the hardness of the paving slabs. It is the only feeling keeping me grounded.

Now I'm lost with pathetic, worthless evidence. What the hell am I supposed to do with an unidentified bus driver, a crown scrawl on the wall of an abandoned house and a cyphered photograph that is almost decidedly fake?

My hope is hinged on the circumstantial, fraying threads of a six-year mystery.

I let out a breath of hot air, screw my eyes closed, and force myself to walk; just as someone slams straight into my shoulder. I stumble back, pushed back with the force, and snap my eyes open, darting my gaze around sharply.

"Oh, I'm sorry!" the woman apologises quickly, yanking wild, dark hair away from her face and flitting her eyes up hastily. She barely glances at me, her mind and body all in a rush, a deep brown handbag hitched up to her elbow.

But she stops when my breath cuts short and I study her for just a moment. Enough time to remember her name. "Josie?" I ask tentatively, my tone fizzling with doubt. But as I look at her a moment longer, her familiar features come into focus. Her meticulous, black lined cat eye; the sharp lines of her cheekbones on her dark skin. Her cool, steady demeaner; a woman who has been crafted by her mother to take over the world.

The woman smiles slowly, her glossed lips twitching as she shrugs in her loosely fitted leopard print trench coat, clearly a style choice she hasn't ditched from her high school days, and her hands swallowed up in its pockets. She balances on thick, suede heels.

"Hey," she eases herself into new words as I consider her carefully. I try to loosen up the hardness in my gaze by smiling. It feels unnatural. "Jughead?"

My cheek twitches. "You're still around town?" I ask, feeling the words slip out before they've fully formulated in my mind. Clearly, my investigative instincts don't switch off even when I'm mid self-doubt.

Josie lets out a little, spiritless laugh, the breeze rippling through her wild hair. A curl sweeps past her face, getting caught in her eyelashes. She bats it away with a neatly manicured hand. "No," she smiles grimly, trying to stop the hair from sticking to her glossed lips. "I wasn't around for Christmas," she shrugs unevenly. "Work only let me get away just over a week ago. Thought I'd better visit my Mom at least once this year."

She giggles as if it's funny. For all the times I talked myself out of seeing my father, I know she doesn't find it funny.

"I, uh- saw the funeral notice about your dad," she pitches in before I respond. Perhaps she already knew I wasn't going to respond. "I'm sorry." Her hand hesitates for a brief second before she rests it firmly against my wrist. It reminds me of what a real, alive hand feels like.

For the first time I don't respond. I have no residual heart in me left to scoff at it. Instead, I nod appreciatively, my tongue darting out to wet my cracked lips, and I smile.

"Thanks, Josie," my voice rumbles low in my throat and she lets go of my arm.

With a fleeting smile of her own, she mutters, "Well, I'll see you around?" flicks her maroon painted nails into the air as she turns around and paces back down the street, in the direction I had just come from.

Watching her inquisitively as she heads off into the distance, I swerve back around and discover that the walk back to the trailer park suddenly feels far more alive.

* * *

The trailer is alight with sound as I creak open the door.

"Jellybean?" I call out, hearing the crackling of voices in the distance, and creep through the door, swinging my jacket off onto a nearby cabinet and closing the door.

The voices don't stop.

As my feet pace through the groaning trailer, the voices grow louder, smothering the whole area. A thundering nervousness creeps in my stomach. I should have made Jellybean go home when I told her to. I shouldn't have let her stay here on her own.

Panicked thoughts race through my mind. Ideas of threats and risks. Imaginations of whoever did something to Betty coming back, discovering what I'm doing and threatening me by hurting my sister.

A beer can crushes violently under my foot as I pace frantically past the kitchen and the dining table, straight into the bedroom.

And I shudder to a stop.

Jellybean sits relaxed cross-legged on the covers of the bed, her head phones dangling around her neck as she stares tightly the portable tape recorder sat in front of her. The one that should be with Kevin right now. The wheels inside the machine churn, the tape playing, as a voice crackle out into the air.

My voice.

_I just thought maybe if I came here, I might get a feel for what it was like. When she vanished._

My throat tightens. I pace forward and stab the stop button on the tape recorder, reeling it into my arms. "You shouldn't be listening to this," I snap quickly, dragging the recorder away with me as if it never existed.

Jellybean's eyes stick to me, my muscles tight around her mouth. "You shouldn't be recording it," she retorts sharply. Her gaze is wild with anger and concern.

I swerve around to face her, feeling my eyes darken and tighten. "I told you not to get involved!" I wave the tape recorder at her, hearing the tape rattle inside like loose bones. She stares back at me, unnerved.

Instead of coiling away, she swings her legs unevenly off the bed like they're the wooden limbs of a puppet, and she snaps to her feet. "I  _knew_  you were up to something!" she growls, her voice breaking sharply. "I just- I was  _hoping_  you weren't-"

"Jellybean," I say in a low voice, flitting my eyes to hers warningly. Hers are watery and fierce. " _Don't-_ " my voice grates against the back of my throat. It grinds in between my teeth. "This has got nothing to do with you."

"It's got  _everything_ to do with me!" she barks, a stubborn tear slithering down her cheek and Jellybean swipes it away fiercely with the palm of her hand, leaving a faint red mark on her skin. "You're my  _brother_. You don't think I'm  _worried_?!" her unkept hair sweeps wildly around the room as she shakes her gaze around the room as if to look for something to help her.

I crack my mouth open. My words have dried up. My hands shake as they clasp onto the recorder behind my back.

"You're not a police officer," Jellybean keeps spewing out her words, her eyes frantic and painful. I stumble back, feeling my bottom lip shiver slightly. "You're not even a private investigator! You're just a stupid junior editor at a crime magazine who thinks, because he reads about other cases for his day job, he's going to try and solve this one, so he can get a promotion at his work and stop sorting files for his boss in his spare time!" Jellybean's breath catches as her crazed sentence sputters to a stop.

She stands still.

I stare back at her, watching her chest rise and fall as she steadies herself. Her face is smothered with tears, her nails tapping erratically into her palm. Her lip quivers as she stares up at me, her eyes the definition of pleading.

And I drop the recorder from my hand, hearing it thump onto the carpet, and I stride forward and scoop her into my arms. She clings onto me as she cries desperately.

"I'm sorry," I mutter over and over again, feeling her bones shiver. My arms tighten around her. Her tears wet my shoulder.

Once her shoulders have stopped shuddering and I can hear her breath steady, I pry myself carefully away from her, but keeping her close. My hands rest on her arms. "Jellybean," I find myself saying as delicately as I can, looking her meaningfully in the eye. "This is important to me, okay? It's not about me getting a promotion."

I stop my words before I irritate her anymore. Instead, I nod slowly. "But, if it worries you so much," I take a deep breath, feeling a peace settle over me. Something that's been nagging at me all day, that became increasingly apparent as I'd walked back here, "I'll stop. Okay?"

Jellybean nods slowly, strands of her dark hair sticking to her tear stained cheeks. She doesn't move to brush them away.

"If," I clarify to myself more than anyone, my fingers stilling. "If Kevin can't find the book, I'll give up."

Jellybean's nostrils flare. She stops for a moment before fleeting her eyes to the recorder now on the ground and whispering, "He only brought that."

The truth begins to settle into my stomach. So, this is it. This is where it ends.

I breathe in steadily. "Okay."

And I wrap my sister into another hug, resting my chin on the crown of her head and I stare out through the thin window above the bed. I scatter Betty's ashes into the air. I said goodbye to my father like this too.

* * *

The light from the lamp flickers like a dying firefly as I sit hunched over the table. The cyphered photograph is propped up by my thumb and index finger. Betty smiles so hopefully out at me. Maybe I should give this to Sheriff Keller after all. I'll collect the envelope Archie promised to deliver and hand it in as an anonymous piece of evidence. I'll include a note about the book and the assurance that Archie has nothing to do with it.

And then I'll gather up my things, lock the trailer door for the last time and skip town again.

With a heavy, nervous sigh, I rest the photograph down. It sits lifeless on the table as if it doesn't know that it holds the answer to the one mystery I couldn't solve.

And maybe that's because Betty was never here to help me like she'd always done.

Cupping my face with my propped-up hands, my elbows digging into the wood of table. The other polaroid's I'd snapped inside the house are spread out in front of me. I suppose the house will get knocked down eventually and whatever that crown means will be lost to time.

Maybe it really is just unrelated graffiti.

Jellybean shifts where she sleeps on the sofa. I look at her and smile sadly. I must remember why I'm giving this up. Why I'm giving Betty up.

With a resolute exhale of breath, I reach out and shuffle together the polaroid's in one swift motion, staring at them one last time and-

I freeze. My hand reaches out and plucks at the corner of one of the polaroid's, pulling it up to stare at it closer. It's an image of the living room of the abandoned house, cushions stripped from the sofa, the coffee table sitting wonky with a broken, splintered leg. And a window shaded by a single, moth eaten burgundy curtain. The other side of the window is laid bare. The other curtain has been ripped off. It isn't there.

The feet of my chair grate violently against the floor of the trailer as I push it back. I snap my gaze quickly towards Jellybean, worried I've woken her up. She stirs but keeps her eyes closed and snuggles deeper into the couch cushions.

I let out a breath, stand up quickly, grab my jacket and whisper a quick  _sorry_  to her as I disappear out of the door.

This is the last time, I promise.

* * *

Sweet Pea looks unfazed as I yank the burgundy curtain open and pace into the back room of the Whyte Wyrm. He chews on the inside of his cheek, blinking bored, until I slam the polaroid picture onto the table in front of him and say, sharply, "Where did you say you got this curtain from again?"

Panic streaks his face as his jaw muscles tighten. He paces forward and yanks across the stolen curtain over again, leaving them in privacy again. "Be quiet," he hisses sharply but his eyes are wild with fear. They dart around the room as if there might be someone hiding in here, listening in. They land back on me with a desperate pleading. "Please don't tell them."

"What?" I scoff. "That you're scavenging from the house that's about to be knocked down? So there'll be no evidence left that any of this stuff," I jab at the old cabinet and rickety table, "came from there in the first place? Is  _that_ why?!"

"No," Sweet Pea grinds out, glaring at me to be quiet. "I'll  _explain_ , okay, but you've got to shut  _up_."

For the first time in a long time, I do what I'm told.

He lowers himself down onto one of the chairs at the table and ushers me to do the same. Cautiously, I follow him and sit slowly in the chair, hearing it creak under my weight.

He fiddles with his worn, tattooed fingers and lets out a puff of air. I sit jaggedly across from him, unable to find a comfortable position on this uneven chair.

Sweet Pea lifts his eyes to look at me. "I lost my trailer."

"What?" I blink back at him. I try to force my voice to keep a low tone. He briefly glances at me gratefully.

"Somebody came to me for help," he says slowly, his voice gruff as if he hasn't practiced saying any of this at all. "I think she was desperate. I tried to help her. Which lost me my job."

"Why?" I ask, my mind churning as ideas of who this  _her_ could be consume me. Jellybean's voice in my head grates it to a stop. Just listen, Jughead.

"I think getting a serpent involved hindered her case," he says tiredly, laughing humourlessly at the truth of his statement. I'd forgotten Sweet Pea's interest in becoming a lawyer when he was in school. "Whoever is out to get her found out I was trying to figure things out for her and basically destroyed everything for me."

"As a threat," I mutter allowed, feeling realisation twist in my head.

"As a threat," he confirms. His eyes are sad. I can't tell if he's sad for himself or for this mysterious woman he wished he could have helped. Or both.

"Nowhere would hire me until Archie came along," he continues, scoffing as if he never thought Archie would be of any help to him. "He offered me a construction job at his company which kept money coming in, enough to keep my rent up for the trailer."

"Then, of course, my colleagues kept complaining about me. They felt  _unsafe_ , they said," Sweet Pea spits mockingly, shaking his head weakly. "So, of course Archie had to let me go."

I stay silent.

"He was very sorry about it, mind you," Sweet Pea assures me, but he doesn't sound particularly grateful. He sighs. He doesn't sound bitter either.

Then Sweet Pea reaches forward and taps the polaroid picture with his index finger. "So," he exhales. "I've been staying at this place."

Oh. My adrenaline crackles and fades.

"Sounds pathetic, right?" Sweet Pea spits. His anger doesn't reach his eyes.

I lick my dry lips, hesitating but sure. "So, the serpents have been protesting for it not to be knocked down."

"Yes," he says sharply. "But they don't know the real reason why and you're not going to tell them."

I fling my hands up into the air in peace.

He eyes me carefully before nodding. He glances back down at his tangled hands.

I let out a puff of air. I'd gotten ahead of myself again, expecting this to be more than it was. I don't even know what I'd been expecting? That Sweet Pea would reveal he'd made the crown marking or that he'd been the one to take Betty in the first place?

They all sound like pathetic excuses now. I scoff at myself.

"Sorry for bothering you," I mutter apologetically, pushing myself up from the uncomfortable chair, ready to leave. But Sweet Pea stops me with a harsh hand on my arm.

"There's something else," he says meaningfully.

I fall back into my chair with a thump.

"What?" I ask quickly. No matter how many times I tell it not to, my heart still hammers at the prospect of some new information. Something new to cling on to.

Part of me prays that it isn't anything like that. Because then it'll be easier to let go.

Sweet Pea swallows sharply. "Archie came to me," he inhales through his nose. "I guess I owed him a favour. He said- he knew you were up to something. He gave me his number and asked me to follow you."

My muscles tighten. I listen intently.

"I wasn't going to," Sweet Pea scoffs at the thought of ever helping Archie, "but then you turned up at the house. Luckily I wasn't  _inside_ at the time." He raises his eyebrows harshly at me and I pull backwards. Sweet Pea was hanging around the abandoned house when I'd been there? "But- I admit, I was worried about what you were up to, so I texted Archie and told him where you were. And," he shrugs unevenly. "I guess he told his dad to call you."

I let out a sharp, breathy laugh. It echoes in the small place, mocking me. How ironic that I'd thought that call was just coincidental and, in reality, it was all a set up.

My face falls. And I thought I was so clever.

With an irritated breath, I run a frustrated hand over my hat, tugging at loose strands and at hairs peeking out from under it at the base of my skull. Sweet Pea grumbles in agreement across from me.

I glance at him for a brief moment. He catches my gaze, responding with an ironic, settling smile.

And it's like the flash of a camera. I see myself. The desperate teenager running from his girlfriend's disappearance and the people who suspect him, lunging for the need to get out of town. Needing to escape.

And I move on impulse.

My hand buries into my jean pocket, feeling my keys still lying there like a lump. I pull them out, the metal clanging against each other, and Sweet Pea glances at me in confusion. Fiddling with the key ring, I grate one of the keys off of it and shove it towards the man in front of me.

"What?" he coughs, staring at it in bemusement.

"That's a spare key to my apartment in New York," I say as if on command, shoving the remains of my keys back into my pocket.

Sweet Pea splutters, his eyes locked on the key in disbelief.

"I'm not going to be leaving here straight away so you can," I hesitate, remembering my promise to Jellybean, before forcing myself to continue, "get away for a while." I nod to my words, feeling myself suddenly agree to them.

"Then, when you need to come back," I assure him, my lips quirking into a short smile, "You can have my dad's trailer. I own it anyway and I'm not going to be staying here for the rest of my life so-" I shrug feeling myself smile wider, more open. "But it's crappy and littered with beer cans, just warning you."

" _Thank_  you," Sweet Pea's voice cracks in between us, breaking off my words. He looks at me in disbelief. In  _relief_. As if he'd been waiting for some way to get away. Like I'd had to all those years ago.

I nod, assuring him I'm being serious, before he reaches forward and captures the key in his palm and presses it securely against his skin.

* * *

The trailer is quiet as I open the door and close it as silently as I can. I peel my jacket off my shoulders and make sure to click the lock closed on the door before glancing at my sister still curled up on the couch.

I smile shortly, not wanting to put on the lights so as not to wake her. Instead, I step quietly towards her, crouching beside her and silently wish her a good night's sleep. I debate about moving her to the bed and sleeping on the couch myself, but she looks so peaceful, I don't want to wake her.

Instead I reach out and pat her hair gently, muttering quietly, "Sleep well, Bean."

As I pull my hand away, my smile stays on my face.

Until I spot the pages of a book peaking out from under the cushion she leans her head on.

I stare at it for a moment too long before inching my hand forward and carefully tugging it out from under the weight of her head. And I stare down at it in the dim light in disbelief.

Resting in the palms of my hand is the Nancy Drew Secret Code Activity Book.

I scoff darkly, keeping it as low to my throat as possible. I guess this investigation isn't over after all.


	14. Click

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Crawls out from the shadows*Okay… so this has been sitting unfinished for months. I have written and rewritten and rewritten the start of this chapter over and over again. Nothing seemed to stick and neither did my motivation.
> 
> I have to be honest, I avoided writing this for a long while. I just didn't feel I could come back to it without the right mindset or intention. I wanted to write this because I was excited about it, not because I felt the need to please all my lovely readers.
> 
> I know that if I had forced myself to write this chapter months ago, it would not be the same as it is now. It would be lacklustre and weak and would have gone nowhere. In my own way, I'm glad I waited because this chapter is what I wanted it to be and more.
> 
> And it has boosted the story forward so far, it feels like the truth could be revealed soon.
> 
> So TL;DL, I wanted to sincerely apologise for making you wait this long. And thank you for being so patient, it's unbelievable! I love you all! Xx

In her dreams, Jellybean falls. She collapses over cliff edges, tumbles down through rain-beaten air, snags herself on sharp rocks. And without fail she always jolts awake before the ground smashes her skull open.

This time she is crumpled on her father's sofa, the coarse fabric rough on her skin as she dares to grip the seams of the stiff cushions and look over the edge. Her tangled hair tumbles over her cheek as the wind whips it away from her face. Her terrified eyes are captured in the reflection of a thousand windows lining the sky, screwed to the armour of a skyscraper. The city lives on below her, roaring cars and crowds of people passing by

Jellybean yelps in horror, thumping backwards against the back of the sofa. It rocks recklessly, the centre of it balanced on the spire of the skyscraper, threatening to tip any second.

Her throat fills with fear laced air. She screams. Jughead's name grates her throat over and over again. No one below her cares. None of the cars pull on their breaks to stop and look, none of the pedestrians pause their conversations to listen to her screams. She is not a person on the edge threatening to jump. She is not the hostage of King Kong.

She is just a girl on the edge of a sofa hoping that her brother won't let her fall.

The last of her voice is used to cry out his name one more time. Then her fingers slip from the seams of the sofa. And she tumbles off the edge and watches a thousand versions of her fall.

Her body jolts upright. The old clothes she wears stick to her back, her sweat like glue on her skin. The heart in her chest is rattling erratically between her ribs. It needs a minute to breathe. Jellybean gulps in a pint of air and counts to ten.

1…2…3…4…5…

She glances beside her, relieved to find her father's trailer instead of the spike of a skyscraper. The old metal creaks in the tugging wind, a whispering hum. Jellybean relaxes to the familiar sound. It's constant, like a beating heart or a steady breath. It is in places like this that she feels she can be heard.

As steadily as she can, she slips her feet from the sofa, feeling the rough carpet under her bare toes. Her face creaks as she yawns, hoping that Jughead managed to buy some fresh groceries for the fridge. Otherwise she might be having hamburgers for breakfast – again.

She'd like to see Jughead's face if she ever decided to become vegetarian.

Her heartbeat has slowed to a steady thrum as she paces towards the kitchen. The fear from her dream has been replaced by excitement. It fills up the empty cavity of her stomach. She remembers last night; the conversation she'd had with her brother, her desperate need for him to move on. She dreams of home – of heading back to the city with her brother, of spending a holiday with him outside of his nightmares. Of letting her mother wait a few more weeks in Toledo.

Those hopeful thoughts tumble out of her brain as soon as she sees it. The table behind the kitchen; strewn with notes and pictures and, underneath a flickering desk lamp, a book lying open. The book that she had hidden underneath her pillow last night, hoping jughead would never find it.

And here it was, found, lying in front of her. It's limp pages no replacement for the brother who had left it and her and an empty trailer behind.

* * *

In movies, when the code is solved, everything is supposed to slot together. The damsel is saved, the plot twist is revealed, and the villain is caught in loud, explosive, Hollywood style.

In real life it is like a limp microwavable cheeseburger. The outside packaging promises a luscious, rich burger with crisp lettuce and melted cheddar. Instead, you're thrusted with a soggy cowpat, paper thin grass and cheese that tastes like plastic.

I stare at the cypher and scoff at how much hope I'd put into it. Like I'd expected it to morph into a map with flashing neon lights leading me exactly to where Betty is. Instead it's a simple, pointless message. Something that could so easily be sent in a text message.

**Happy birthday**

That's what it says.

Like a morbid birthday card with a missing girl's face on the back.

I stare at the photograph in my hand, the limp realisation of my failures. I had gripped onto it so tightly, my attention so diverted by it, my hopes so stringed to it like a noose.

Now even my fingers don't put effort into holding it. A whisper of wind could blow it from between my fingertips.

I throw the photograph back into my backpack, trying to shake off the way it clings to my mind. It's somebody's idea of a joke. A cynical stab at those still grieving a girl they never had the chance to say goodbye to. A scoff at those who still possess some humanity.

If the photograph was still in my hand, I would have crushed it in my fist by now. My fingers ache. I curl them against my palm.

And lift them to crack my fist against Archie's office door.

" _Happy birthday_."

It's just a whisper in the wind. A trickle against the back of my neck.

But it sounds so close to Betty's voice.

My eyes dart to the end of the corridor. Half opened blinds rattle against the window frame at the end of the hall. The tall, arching plant in the corner shudders in the breeze, it's terracotta pot stark against the clean white walls. Its long, thin shadow looks so much like a ponytail.

I swallow. Why won't Betty let me forget about her?

No matter how many times I try to push thoughts of her out of my mind, she still clings on. After all these years, she's still lingering inside my chest. It's like there's a reserved sign hanging in my heart, waiting for her to return.

Or maybe those are just metaphors of guilt.

I let out a short breath, scoffing at myself before turning to push Archie's office door open. Behind me, the elevator whirs, shudders and then dings. The glossy metal doors slide open.

There's a single footstep before; "Jones?"

My shoulder twitches as I turn. It isn't Archie's voice.

A tall figure strides out of the elevator, his broad shoulders filling out a dark grey and navy raglan shirt. A curl of black hair hangs over his eyes. Slinging a hand into the pocket of his jeans, he breaks into an erratic smile.

"I didn't realise this was a school reunion," Reggie muses aloud, a brief flicker of confusion passing over his face as the elevator doors slide closed behind him. I catch a glimpse of my reflection in them. I don't recognise the man staring back at me. He's frail and weathered and his crown beanie sits limply on his head.

"How you been, Jughead?" Reggie slaps an overly friendly hand against my shoulder as he passes me and pushes Archie's office door open.

I grumble under my breath, flexing my shoulder and I trail behind him like society has always forced me to do.

"Hey, Reggie," Archie hums comfortably, slinging on a jacket as he paces towards the door. "You ready?" He falters as he spots me, one arm of his jacket still hanging off his shoulder. "Oh, Jug. I didn't know you were coming-"

"I wasn't-" I mutter under my breath, passing a sideways, irritated glance at Reggie. As if on cue Reggie's loud, boisterous laugh cuts me off as he shoves me jokingly in the side.

"I found this one loitering around your door like a lost puppy," he chuckles infuriatingly.

I feel like one. Straggly and unwanted and caught on the underside of his show.

"Actually," I stride into Archie's office, bristling past Reggie as I say, "I just came by to pick up the-"

"Oh, right," Archie jolts forwards as if he'd been dosing and paces to his desk, rattling open a drawer and plucking the envelope out of it. I reach for it too quickly, trying to pretend that I haven't been avoiding Archie. He tries to pretend that he doesn't notice. I catch it in the way his eyebrow twitches like an irritating itch.

And Reggie's sunken in eyes dart towards me, watching my rough, insistent movements. I spot the dark skin under his eyes. They're painted by insomnia. It's a face I've worn too often I recognise it instantly.

With jagged movements, I slide the envelope into my bag in an attempt to hide it.

It's probably for the best that Reggie's here. Otherwise Archie would be grilling me about what I've found out about Betty. I can't bear to say the scratchy, cracked word, " _Nothing_ " aloud.

"Thanks," I mutter, hearing my voice break before turning swiftly towards the door.

"It was good to see you, Jughead," Reggie says suddenly, his voice chiselled to a gentler tone. It's the first time he's ever sounded real to me.

I glance at him briefly, shrug once and mumble, "Yeah" with a brief twitch of my lips.

And I leave the room, wondering where he was on the night that Betty disappeared.

* * *

The cassette tape whirs for a few more seconds before spluttering to a stop. I click the rewind button, hearing Kevin and Polly and Pop's voices squirm backwards, a tangled web of words and mutterings. Jellybean's headphones smother my ears as I slouch over the tape recorder in POP's diner, crouched in the corner of a shaded booth. I haven't listened to it since Kevin had dropped it off at the trailer when I was out. My priorities had been toyed with elsewhere.

I sigh.

There's a haunting feeling about listening to voices speak backwards. Their syllables are incoherent and smothered. And yet, amidst that jumble of sounds, I half expect for every truth to be revealed. Like the Pokemon theme played backwards. Or peeling back the curtains of the universe.

Yet all it is a mess of reality.

My thumb hovers over the play button. I recognise the sound of Kevin's backwards voice jolt into Polly's. I press play.

" _I don't know anything, I just-"_

" _Was Betty in here the day before she disappeared?"_

There's a click between the two phrases. Like a rift between conversations. I press pause. The button makes the exact same sound.  _Click._

_Click_.

The tape plays again. I hear Pop respond. He's hesitant but truthful and I hear it in the way his voice steadies. But I know all this already. I've heard the tap played over and over. How Betty came here the day before she disappeared. How Kevin saw the footage. How she left without meeting anyone.

Kevin relayed all this to me over the phone. I asked him hours ago as soon as I'd heard it on the tape.

It is not Pop's words that I care about anymore. It is Polly's words. Or more accurately, the absence of them. The words lost in the space between her voice and Kevin's.

It is the-

_Click._

A gloved finger presses down the pause button from across from me. The sudden silence is jarring. I glance up shortly, expecting to see Jellybean thumped down in the booth across from me, her arms crossed and her eyes irritated.

But instead the gentle, tired eyes of Josie smile back at me.

"Are you going to eat that?" She asks with an amused smile as she points at the greasy plate beside me currently at a risk of being knocked over by my elbow. On the plate is a half-eaten burger that has been sat stone cold for the last half hour.

"Feel free," I nudge the plate towards her and she cringes. My lips twitch up into a smile. For the first time in a while, it feels real.

"You look less stressed when you smile," she muses aloud. It sounds less like a compliment and more like an observation. Then, with a bristled shiver, she corrects herself. "Sorry, I didn't ask you if I could sit here."

I shrug. I've lost my energy to fight for anything anymore. Even a booth at POP's.

She relaxes. "What are you listening to?" she asks, her dark eyes glancing down at the tape recorder. I reach my hand out and scoop it towards me, hooking Jellybean's headphones down from my ears.

"You ask a lot of questions," I say shortly, tucking the tape recorder back into my bag. The sound of the zip as I pull the bag closed is sharp and metallic.

She smiles apologetically, her eyes flittering over me with interest. They're cautious, like they're hiding behind a curtain. "From what I remember, you used to do the same thing."

A chuckle escapes my throat. The crack of POP's door flying open snaps it short.

Sheriff Keller strides in, sweaty hands clipped into his belt, fingers twitching erratically. He walks over to Pop to hovers behind the counter, muttering something to the older man who shakes his head decisively.

Josie's head darts to me as I jump up from the booth. There's something not right. I can see it in the way the Sheriff's bicep muscle twitches. His fist is clenched. It's an action I find myself doing all the time when I'm anxious.

The Sheriff turns away from Pop, his greying eyes shaded by eyebrows and intense worry. They snap to cold attention when they latch onto me striding towards him.

"I don't really have time for this, Jughead," he lays low in his throat, turning towards the door, a vein in his neck twitching.

"What's happened, Sheriff?" I ask boldly, my gaze sharpening with authority. He scoffs back at me, mocking my boldness. But then his eyes weaken, and he swallows hard. It's as if he's admitting that he needs help for the first time.

"Kevin's gone," he says bluntly, his voice low so nobody else in the diner can hear him but me. There's a mutual trust between us. A tolerance that has turned to respect. I hone my ears to hear him. My breath quickens with confusion. I'd only spoken to Kevin a few hours ago. There'd been nothing in his voice to suggest he was distressed or scheming or-

Sheriff Keller's jaw tightens as if he's fighting with himself whether to tell me more. He can see the panic in my eyes. The realisation that this is all happening again. That it is all happening again, and I can't do anything. Then, with a brisk resolution, he says, "And he's taken the car."

**Author's Note:**

> This story is highly inspired by true crime podcasts and the disappearances of real life people.  
> This is not meant to be insensitive to the subject and I apologise if it is.  
> Please keep awareness alive for cold cases and missing persons. 
> 
> For more info, listen to podcasts like Up and Vanished, Missing Maura Murray and Someone Knows Something.


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